Appendix D Letter from BOAT/U.S.
December 16, 1997
National Research Council
Board of Atmospheric Sciences and Climate
2101 Constitution Ave, NW 20418
Dear Sirs;
This is to express the support of Boat Owners Association of the United States (BOAT/U.S.) for the National Weather Service's C-MANN Weather Buoy System. BOAT/U.S. represents over a half million members from all 50 states. Of these Members, almost 150,000 insure their boats through a unique “Loss Prevention Program” that seeks not just to insure boats but also to learn why losses occured and to educate members on how they could have been avoided.
It is almost axiomatic that to avoid trouble on the water a boat's skipper must constantly be aware of the weather conditions. As a source of real-time weather and sea-state information, the C-MANN system has proven to be invaluable. No other source of information—radio, television, or VHF radio broadcasts—do as much to help boaters avoid dangerous weather conditions.
For the past few seasons, BOAT/U.S. has promoted use of the C-MANN system in both the BOAT/U.S. Magazine and in Seaworthy, a Loss-Prevention publication of the Marine Insurance Division. The result is that the BOAT/U.S. membership has come to rely on the C-MANN buoys to insure their safety on the water.