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Benefits of Reducing Boating Accidents: USCG requests comments on report

The U.S. Coast Guard (USCG) announced the availability of a report, “Estimating Benefits of Reducing Recreational Boating Accidents: Alternative Sources of Information on Fatalities, Injuries, and Property Damages” in the June 28, 2013 issue of the Federal Register. The study is dated September 12, 2011.

Benefits of Reducing Boating Accidents USCG report

Benefits of Reducing Boating Accidents

The report reviews data related to recreational boating accidents to help USCG determine how to better quantify the benefits of Coast Guard regulations, policies, and programs. It compares USCG’s Boating Accident Report Database (BARD) data to other databases containing similar records (like hospital visit databases, cause of death databases, NEISS, etc) in an attempt to estimate the number of unreported accidents in BARD, and the cost of those accidents.

The report also discusses the “willingness to pay” approach to placing values on preventing certain types of accidents/injuries. It also reviews the status of property damage reports in BARD and how well they might represent the total amount of property damage caused by boating accidents.

USCG is encouraging public comments and submission of related materials on this study via Regulations.gov, fax, mail, or by hand delivery. All comments and materials received will be published on Regulations.gov.

USCG is especially seeking comment on the content of the report, any additional data or analysis to support or detract from the conclusions drawn by the authors, and anything that might help them get a better handle on total property damages.

The report was authored by Industrial Economics, Incorporated of Cambridge, Massachusetts, and Lisa A Robinson, an independent consultant.


We quickly scanned the report and already noted several items we feel are of considerable significance. We will further review the report, file our public comments, and also place them on PropellerSafety.com when time permits.

Please take some time to review the report and submit your comments.


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