Mandatory life jackets a good idea
Frank Bucholtz photo Everyone using a speedboat service to cross Freetown harbour in Sierra Leone, West Africa must use life jackets - including all the crew members. Such a rule makes abundant sense for the many excursion boats in B.C. waters. My former colleague Sandy Macdougall, longtime reporter at the Tri-City News and Maple Ridge News, made an excellent comment on his Facebook page about the terrible tragedy in Tofino yesterday. He said: "Why aren't all passengers on any size whale watching vessel required to wear either a life jacket or a survival suit? Although the Leviathan II had sufficient life jackets on board, it appears that no passenger or crew member was wearing one. It reminds me of the few occasions when I covered drowning victims at Pitt Lake where the boats involved all had life jackets carefully stowed away and which were entirely useless to the victims because there just isn't time to dig them out and put them on properly in a sudden emer...