So Friday me and the wife decided to get out on the lake for a little wake-boarding. Figured we would get out there before all the idiots showed up over the weekend. Lake Lanier really isn't worth going out on on the weekends, there are way too many people and most of them are unconscious. When we got out on the boat I filled all the ballast up, roughly 2300 lb for wake-boarding and proceeded to drive to our favorite little out of the way cove.

After about a 5 minute boat drive I noticed that the temperature on the boat was reading around 100 degrees. Obviously this isn't a temperature that you would expect to see after a 5 minute boat ride, even though we really never got on it, we really just cruised at about 15 MPH to our destination. After seeing the temperature I immediately ran to the back of the boat and lifted the engine hatch.

The entire engine compartment was filled with water and I noticed that the water was starting to come out on the carpet. I saw water gushing out toward the back of the engine (actually the front if it were a car) and noticed that the large J shaped tube that is connected to the raw water pump was split the entire length. Not knowing exactly what to do I figured that the best way to stop the water flow was to shut off the engine. This stopped the flow of water into the boat and allowed the bilge to catch up. I immediately dumped all my ballast and then disconnected the drain line on one of the bags and stuck the hose into the bilge to assist with draining all the water.

Fortunately there was an extremely nice person in a malibu that pulled me back to the marina. If I see that guy again I will fill his gas tank for sure. Now that I have stopped shaking and changed my underwear I have a few questions about my incident.

So here are my questions.

Why would that hose split? I changed it out already and asked the guy at the boat shop where I bought the replacement hose but he said it just happens because of the heating and cooling of the hose. I just want to make sure there is nothing else that would cause this to happen.

Why is there not a shutoff on the freshwater intake from the factory? in my panic i really noticed that there is no way to shut the water off if anything would happen. Should I install a bronze shutoff valve?

Anyone carrying a manual pump? I have heard of manual pumps you can buy for emergency situations just like this one.

I think thats it for now, I still haven't put it back in the water. I want to make sure this wasnt caused from something else.