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May 19, 2025 at 08:00
The 2025 Canada Safe Boating Week runs May 19-25. This initiative is designed to increase public compliance with safe boating measures and ultimately, to save lives. The Ontario Provincial Police (OPP) will be looking for impaired driving, carriage requirements for lifejackets and Personal Floatation Devices (PFD’s), Liquor Licence Act offences and Canada Shipping Act 2001 offences.
During Safe Boating Awareness Week, boaters and paddlers are encouraged to raise their awareness around every aspect of safe traveling on waterways. Over and above wearing the right lifejacket or personal floatation device and boating sober and drug-free, ensure you and your vessel are prepared and safe for the season, take a boating course, be alert and cold water safe.
Please remember that a properly fitted lifejacket, is not only designed to keep boaters and paddlers afloat, but also helps turn them onto their backs, enabling them to breathe if they are rendered unconscious. 56 paddlers were among the 131 people who lost their lives in boating incidents on OPP-patrolled waterways in the last five years. Between 2020-2024, 34 of those who died in marine incidents were canoeists, 17 were kayakers and five were using stand-up paddleboards.
The data makes a compelling case for the value in wearing a lifejacket. It is virtually impossible to drown if you are floating in the water with a properly fitted lifejacket. Even if you are rendered unconscious in a paddling/boating incident, a lifejacket will keep your head above water and keep you breathing. This is a particularly important message for paddlers/boaters who cannot swim, as a lifejacket is the one piece of equipment that you can count on to save your life.
On those beautiful sunny days, most of us want to get out on the water to use our boats. Just remember that any vessel being underway that has any type of motor, requires the operator to possess a valid Pleasure Craft Operators Card (PCOC) or proof of competency equivalence.
And, any vessel on the water (even paddleboats and canoes) require all the necessary safety equipment on board.
The standard equipment includes:
- 15m floating heaving line
- watertight flashlight
- whistle – *must be Pealess* (or some type of sound signaling device, i.e. horn, or portable air horn, etc.)
- bailing bucket
- a paddle or an oar
- lifejackets or Personal Floatation Devices (PFD’s) for every person on board (*self-inflating PFD’s must be worn*)
- and depending on the size of the vessel and motor being used, it may require proper flares and a fire extinguisher
Horsepower and age restrictions:
- under 12yrs. may operate a boat with up to 10hp
- 12yrs. – 16yrs. may operate a boat with up to 40hp
- 16yrs. and older, there are no horsepower restrictions
- under 16 yrs. regardless of supervision shall NOT operate a Personal Water Craft (PWC): Sea-doo, Jet-Ski, Waverunner
The OPP Marine Program has a fleet of 134 vessels and almost 400 skilled marine officers committed to enforcing boating laws and the safety of Ontario boaters on more than 110,000 square kilometres (95 per cent) of Ontario’s lakes and rivers.
Safe Boating Awareness Week is an annual, national campaign led by the Canadian Safe Boating Council. This year’s campaign runs from May 19-25, 2025.
Should you observe a suspected impaired driver, please dial 911 or contact the OPP at 1-888-310-1122.
- Safe Boating Week – May May 19-25 - May 19, 2025
- OPP – Paddlers account for almost half of boating deaths - May 16, 2025
- Thunder Bay OPP – Investigation continues into Fatal Collision - May 12, 2025
