Jet Skis of Death

The Sea Doo we are riding is considered relatively slow in jet ski circles. It was designed to hold three people and tops out at around 45 mph. Even still, when we hit the four foot wake of the big cruiser plowing its way down Indian Slough we still soar five feet in the air. The much faster and lighter Yamaha X520 traveling behind us at about 20 mph faster skies triples the height we do. The rider noses it down into a graceful fifteen foot decent and tunnels underwater after landing. Me and my girlfriend are laughing and having a fantastic time.

Less than a mile downriver at a place called Hidden Beach a helicopter is airlifting a fourteen year old kid to Diablo Valley Hospital. About the same time we were jumping the cruiser’s wake he was slamming into a Jet boat at sixty miles an hour on his jet ski. The Jet boat, a high gloss metallic flake blue color is slowly sinking in about seven feet of water when we pull up to see what’s going on. The people on the Jet boat were able to jump overboard before the Jet Ski demolished the boat. The kid wasn’t so lucky and went head first through the boat’s windshield. A sheriff driving a patrol boat is now interviewing the driver of the Jet boat. The driver, 22, is on the beach and is clearly intoxicated, but he was stationary at the time of the crash and there are no laws on the books for piloting a boat while intoxicated as of yet. There’s no word as to whether or not the kid was drunk too, but since he had been hanging out at Hidden Beach all day it is highly likely.

“They come out here in the summer and drink until they pass out usually,” the sheriff told us when we stopped to see if we could help.

I look at the sinking Jet boat for a minute, but have to turn away when I see the smear of blood across the windshield. My girlfriend is crying and shaking. She says she knows the kid from the Jr High she attended last year before becoming a Freshmen at our high school. I know that almost all of the twenty or so people out here on Hidden Beach know the kid, but almost all of them have scattered because of the sheriff. Underage drinking is so wide spread out here that half the kids come home late in the afternoon so wasted they can barely pilot their various watercrafts back to their homes in Striker’s Bay, a local water bound upper middle class and wealthy suburb on the delta. This is the third airlift since the school year ended a month ago.

The dangers out here in these narrow and shallow canals full of boats and jet skis, some of which travel in excess of one hundred mph are varied and perilous even for those like us who are stone cold sober. Tricky tide changes can raise or drop water levels by several feet in less than an hour. The banks are lined with refrigerator sized riprap that has destroyed its fair share of boats and watercraft over the years.

My uncle has a house out here and I spend way more time then I think his original invitation intended. But it is a tool for impressing potential girlfriends as well. When I can time it right and gain access to the entire arsenal of goodies, jet skis, sailboat, the Ski Nautique, and the interior of the house itself it makes for an impressive first date.

But exposing my fairly new girlfriend to what may very well be a fatal accident of one of her former classmates isn’t producing the intended effect today. In fact, rather than the fun and excitement I was hoping might lead to other things back at the house she is now terrified of the Ski Doo. I do my best to try and gently coax her back onto the Ski Doo explaining I will go very slow and be very careful, “no more wake jumping on the way back” I tell her. My attempt fails and I sharply tell her unless she wants to swim the four miles back to Striker’s Bay she needs to get on the jet ski now. Things brings on a burst of tears and I feel like a stupid ape trying to puzzle out the Rosetta Stone.

The sheriff tells her she can ride back to the Striker’s Bay marina in his boat the Jet boat crash victims. I huff and frown, but agree to follow along back to the marina. The cop travels along at a leisurely 25 mph. I follow him for a while and then blow past him at 45 mph purposely ignoring the 5 mph “no wake” zone near the marina reasoning that he won’t ticket me since he has all kinds of other shit to deal with concerning the sunken boat, accident, and his passenger’s drunkenness.

At the dock of the marina I stewed in my anger and impatience as the jet ski bobbed in the water next to the fuel pumps. I could smell the gasoline and a rainbow oil slick floated around near the docks. As I expected, the sheriff is too busy with other things to mention my infraction.

I convince my girlfriend to board the Ski Doo at the docks and I make the slow ride back to my uncle’s house. We barely speak as I put the Ski Doo away and lock up the house. The same silence permeates my car as I drive her home. We cold cheek kiss as she leaves and that’s pretty much it for our relationship. It years later before I realize my shitty attitude and anger is the rock that sank that ship, along with many others over the years.