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Florida man arrested after trying to cross Atlantic in hamster wheel vessel

bbc.com

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Re: Florida man arrested after trying to cross Atlantic in hamster wheel vessel

#31

Post by alex_lav »

bell-cot wrote: post #5
alex_lav wrote: post #3

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yeah I was curious what law is actually being broken by doing this? > [US Coast Guard] officers determined Baluchi was conducting a manifestly unsafe voyage," the criminal complaint says. Since when is it illegal to do things that are unsafe in America? Why can I own a gun and fireworks and liquor and gas stoves and toxic chemicals then? > Officials said he refused to step off the vessel and threatened to kill himsel…

As a generality , "unsafe voyage" is a reasonable thing to outlaw. Morons will need search & rescue on the CG's taxpayer-supplied dime, then maybe need medical care at public expense, too. Plus too-trusting friends & family who are along for the ride on their SS Davey Jones, collisions with other boats, cleaning up the wreckage and oil slicks, etc., etc. Vs. this guy's "water wheel" seems to fairly-mostly avoid those…

> As a generality, "unsafe voyage" is a reasonable thing to outlaw. Morons will need search & rescue on the CG's taxpayer-supplied dime, then maybe need medical care at public expense, too.

Of all the stupid things regular people can do to add strain/cost to the united states' social systems, "unsafe voyage" seems pretty low on the list, both in cost and frequency. I'd guess that injuries as a result of accidental gun discharge and/or fireworks easily 10x-100x yearly spend on search and rescue.

> Plus too-trusting friends & family who are along for the ride on their SS Davey Jones, collisions with other boats, cleaning up the wreckage and oil slicks, etc., etc.

I am not arguing that unsafe voyage is a bad idea. I am arguing that it's out of character for this country to ban a specific bad idea due to safety.

Re: Florida man arrested after trying to cross Atlantic in hamster wheel vessel

#32

Post by p_l »

alex_lav wrote: post #31
bell-cot wrote: post #5

Earlier quoted context omitted.

As a generality , "unsafe voyage" is a reasonable thing to outlaw. Morons will need search & rescue on the CG's taxpayer-supplied dime, then maybe need medical care at public expense, too. Plus too-trusting friends & family who are along for the ride on their SS Davey Jones, collisions with other boats, cleaning up the wreckage and oil slicks, etc., etc. Vs. this guy's "water wheel" seems to fairly-mostly avoid those…

> As a generality, "unsafe voyage" is a reasonable thing to outlaw. Morons will need search & rescue on the CG's taxpayer-supplied dime, then maybe need medical care at public expense, too. Of all the stupid things regular people can do to add strain/cost to the united states' social systems, "unsafe voyage" seems pretty low on the list, both in cost and frequency. I'd guess that injuries as a result of accidental gu…

Generally it's about limited, numerically, rescue resources that might then be unable to respond to a more serious eventm

Re: Florida man arrested after trying to cross Atlantic in hamster wheel vessel

#33

Post by hollerith »

qingcharles wrote: post #29

70 miles off shore is international waters. Most countries limit extends 12 miles these days. (excluding resource extraction) Why does the coastguard have jurisdiction? Because it was launched from the USA? At what point is your vehicle a ship? i.e. is a surfboard a ship?

Here a defense of the Coast Guard's actions.

Oceanic trade generates great economic value and requires seafarers. Seafaring is inherently dangerous, but the rate of death of seafarers is much less than it would be if it weren't for coast guards, one of whose main functions is rescuing seafarers in distress. This rescuing function is expensive, so one of the rules of the sea that the countries of the world have agreed on is to make it illegal to do anything that puts too great an economic stress on the rescuing function. It is OK with me.

Try to mount a poorly-planned and poorly-funded journey to the South Pole and the same thing will happen to you if they catch you--for the same reason.

Re: Florida man arrested after trying to cross Atlantic in hamster wheel vessel

#34

Post by PlunderBunny »

I wonder if someone can do some back-of-the-envelope maths to figure out how much energy (calories) he would need to burn to cross the Atlantic, and therefore how much food he would need. I suspect his voyage isn't possible, even in calm weather, because the amount of energy required increases the amount of food required, which increases the weight, which increases the amount of food... a rocket liftoff problem with no solution.

Re: Florida man arrested after trying to cross Atlantic in hamster wheel vessel

#35

Post by paulddraper »

8f2ab37a-ed6c wrote: post #16
bell-cot wrote: post #2

At what point should the Coast Guard just say "Give us contact details for your next of kin, then go ahead. YOYO."? It's not like they'll be inundated with Darwin Award wannabe's anywhere near as creative and determined as this guy.

The problem is that this will turn into another one of those high profile search and rescue operations like the Titanic submersible. The Coast Guard is going to have to spend weeks looking for this dude’s debris under constant mass media scrutiny, wasting untold amounts of taxpayer dollars. No amount of “he made his own adult decision” is going to fix the optics of not helping his family on CNN begging the state to b…

Bingo.

Society is not okay with that.

Re: Florida man arrested after trying to cross Atlantic in hamster wheel vessel

#36

Post by paulddraper »

> "My goal is to not only raise money for homeless people, raise money for the Coast Guard, raise money for the police department, raise money for the fire department," he told WOFL-TV in Orlando in 2021.

> "They are in public service, they do it for safety, and they help other people."

Re: Florida man arrested after trying to cross Atlantic in hamster wheel vessel

#37

Post by paulddraper »

ndhfkashdben wrote: post #13

I don't understand why they have to intervene besides giving him warnings. At some point, tell him he's not their responsibility anymore if he refuses again and go do something more productive. Countless human hours spent preventing someone from doing something that would harm no one but himself. There are probably good Samaritan laws forcing public officers to provide "help" if they are informed of a situation and n…

Because someone would report him missing and they'd send out boats to dredge the water for his body anyway.

Re: Florida man arrested after trying to cross Atlantic in hamster wheel vessel

#38

Post by alex_lav »

p_l wrote: post #32
alex_lav wrote: post #31

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> As a generality, "unsafe voyage" is a reasonable thing to outlaw. Morons will need search & rescue on the CG's taxpayer-supplied dime, then maybe need medical care at public expense, too. Of all the stupid things regular people can do to add strain/cost to the united states' social systems, "unsafe voyage" seems pretty low on the list, both in cost and frequency. I'd guess that injuries as a result of accidental gu…

Generally it's about limited, numerically, rescue resources that might then be unable to respond to a more serious eventm

There are a finite amount of firetrucks, ambulances and ER beds per municipality.

Re: Florida man arrested after trying to cross Atlantic in hamster wheel vessel

#40

Post by Alupis »

fnordpiglet wrote: post #27
mikestew wrote: post #21

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Had he ever demonstrated that could get further than his own state, you might have a point. But those reading TFA all the way to the end know that it’s not the first time the Coast Guard has pulled him out of the water, and it’s not been far from where he started.

What wasn’t clear from the article is if he needed to be pulled out of the water or if the coast guard “rescued” him because they just assumed he was insane. (Which seems reasonable). He does however seem to not want to be rescued and allows to hamster wheel himself to a probable death. I do wonder why he isn’t allowed to, people do all sorts of insane things and die doing it and they’re allowed to, such as difficult…

Probably because a few days at sea later... he'll pop his emergency beacon and the Coast Guard will spend a bunch of time and resources plucking him out of the water.

With ocean currents, winds, etc., it seems vastly unlikely his contraption would have traveled any distance the ocean didn't allow anyway.

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