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Alcohol abuse major factor in Arizona boating deaths

With Lake Havasu and the Colorado River ranking fourth in the nation’s top 10 deadliest waters, it seems alcohol intoxicated boat operators are partly to blame, said an Arizona Game and Fish official.

“For a desert state, we are doing pretty bad,” Tim Baumgarten, Arizona OUI/Watercraft program manager.

Baumgarten was the guest speaker at a Lake Havasu Marine Association meeting last week.

“The ultimate goal is to reduce the number of alcohol-related accidents that cause death and injury by detouring OUI violators,” Baumgarten said. “Alcohol abuse is the number one contributor to fatal accidents in America.”

According to the U.S. Coastguard’s Recreational Boating Statistics 2009 report, there were 12.7 million boats registered nationwide in 2009. There were 4,730 recreational boating accidents that killed 736 individuals, injured 3,358 more and caused about $36 million in property damage.

The report noted that alcohol abuse is the leading contributing factor in fatal boating accidents. Alcohol abuse was the leading factor in 16 percent of the boating accident deaths recorded last year. About 31 percent of all fatal boating accidents are alcohol abuse related.

For a more complete list of factors, operator inattention, operator inexperience, excessive speed, improper lookout and alcohol rank as the top five primary contributing factors in recreational boating accidents nationwide, the report said.

“Alcohol is the most abused drug in the U.S.,” Baumgarten said. “They say it doesn’t matter when talking about alcohol and gender, but it does matter. Men can hold more alcohol.”

The alcohol goes to those parts of the body with the highest amount of water. Because women have less water in their bodies, the alcohol is less diluted and means it takes fewer drinks for women to become intoxicated, he said.

Another myth is it takes just one alcoholic drink to reach Arizona’s legal limit of .08 percent blood alcohol concentration. Baumgarten says this is not true. In general, a 170-pound man could have four drinks in two hours and still be below the legal alcohol limit.

“But have five alcoholic drinks in two hours and it will probably put you over (the legal alcohol limit),” Baumgarten added.

Impaired to the slightest degree is used by law enforcement to describe a person who is below the legal limit of alcohol yet displays obvious signs of impairment.

“That is an individual thing, but people can be impaired at a low blood alcohol concentration,” Baumgarten said. During a wet lab used to train officers to determine impairment, a test subject’s BAC was .062, but he was throwing up and he couldn’t even sit up, he explained.

“(The test subject) could’ve been a non-drinker and just had never been that high before,” he said.

The body metabolizes about two thirds of a drink per hour. So, consumers with a one-drink-per-hour approach will have one drink every three hours that has not yet been processed. In 12 hours, that leaves four drinks in the body and therefore could cause intoxication, Baumgarten said.

Eating while drinking helps to slow the body’s absorption of the alcohol. Baumgarten said individuals who drink without eating peak at a much faster rate than someone who has eaten. Also, having food in one’s stomach while drinking alcohol has nothing to do with routine alcohol breath tests.

“We take breath samples, not stomach samples,” he said.

For Baumgarten, he has developed a keen eye for impaired boaters over the years.

“If I see a guy dancing naked on the bow of his boat, I am going to suspect some type of impairment,” he said.

Drinking energy drinks to sober up is another farce.

“Energy drinks only make you wide awake and drunk. The effects of the alcohol will only diminish as fast as the liver can process it. Make no mistake about it, (alcohol) is a toxin. Your body recognizes it as a toxin,” Baumgarten said.

AZGFD teams with several other waterway-based local, state and federal law-enforcement agencies to set up random checkpoints at different locations on the Colorado River and Lake Havasu, Arizona. Baumgarten did say he has seen a trend of more and more designated driver’s in the past 10 years.

“I think we are making headway,” he said.