The state’s new law was driven by three fatal kayak incidents in 2022, as well as the state’s recognition that nearly half of its boating-related drownings occurring between 2018 and 2021 were paddle craft users not wearing life jackets. Rhode Island is the second state requiring persons, in an all-encompassing range of paddle craft, to wear a life jacket at all times, regardless of age. New Mexico was the first.
A few additional states, including Pennsylvania, Connecticut and Massachusetts, have seasonal laws for all paddlers to be wearing a PFD during the colder months.
Every U.S. state require children to wear a PFD while paddling, and in the majority of states that age consideration is 13 and under.
The Rhode Island has been an educational mission of the U. S. Coast Guard.
The USCG 2022 summary of statistics on recreational boating incidentsstates, “Where the cause of death was known, 75 percent of fatal boating incident victims drowned. Of those drowning victims with reported life jacket usage, 85 percent were not wearing a life jacket.”
Three out of every four drownings that occurred in the Coast Guard’s 2022 report were in vessels 21 feet or under, a category nearly all paddle craft fall into.
The Coast Guard also shares that in 2022, 21 percent of drownings involved a canoe or kayak.
The message the Coast Guard has is to put on a life jacket. In Rhode Island, this safety message has evolved the way of the seat belt and will be enforced for paddlers to “click it or ticket” in their effort to make waterways safer for recreation.
Photo: Courtesy Old Town Canoes and Kayaks
