A boating accident occurred Tuesday, March 19, during Day 1 of competition at the Major League Fishing (MLF) Toyota Series on the Harris Chain of Lakes. No serious injuries were reported, but upon investigation of the circumstances surrounding the accident, MLF determined that both boaters intentionally violated a no-wake zone, which resulted in a collision between the boats.
WHERE:
Ski Beach at Venetian Gardens
201 E. Lake Harris Drive
Leesburg, Fla.
NOTES:
Boater Mark Succi of Cataula, Georgia, and his co-angler Jeff Cox of Saline, Michigan, along with boater Douglas Reed of Bridgeton, New Jersey, and his co-angler Mitch Hayes of Chipley, Florida, were involved in the accident. Both boaters were in violation of MLF Toyota Series Rule No. 9. Specifically, Succi and Reed operated their boats in an unsafe manner and violated a posted no-wake area. Succi and Reed have been suspended from all MLF tournaments for at least one year.
Here is an additional video before and after the incident from Eric Panzironi.
According to his video, you can hear the parties discussing running no wake zones to try to beat the check-in time on the way back. Panzironi stated in his video he let them go ahead because he knew he couldn’t make it. The result was one boat coming to neutral prior to getting to a narrow bridge (one reason there are no wake zones) and the other boat didn’t have enough room or time to stop. Amazingly no one was seriously injured, or worse yet, killed when one boat ended up completely on top of the other.
