Flipping a Switch: A 'Quirky' Boat and the Accident That Nearly Killed a Little Girl

Jetski-Pontoon Hybrid Tends To Nose-Dive When Decelerating

This is not a photo of the St. Johns River Accident discussed below. Here, a Marine patrol officer helps a family whose Switch flipped at Haulover Inlet on the East Coast of Florida. This is a screenshot taken from a YouTube video.

To say “capsize” would be misleading. That’s how we describe it when a sailboat overturns, blown over on its side. According to owner Facebook posts, the Switch flips forward. In sailing terminology, this would be called pitchpoling. To paraphrase a British colloquialism: “Butt over breast.”

Go-fast boats are thought to be most dangerous to their operators at high speeds. Speed kills, right?

This is a story about a fairly new production boat that is actually more likely to kill you when you are trying to slow down. Call it a “handling quirk” for now. It’s only when it lands in court as a wrongful-death case that it may officially become a “design flaw.”

A Florida family may have learned about this quirk the hard way over Labor Day weekend when the faux-pontoon boat in which they were riding flipped over in the St. Johns River, trapping an infant underneath it for more than 10 minutes.

A firefighter who happened to be passing by managed to pull 15-month-old Vianca out from under the boat while she still could breathe.

The boat in question was a Sea-Doo Switch Pontoon, a vessel introduced by Bombardier Recreational Products (BRP) to take advantage of a rapidly growing segment of the marine markplace—pontoon boats. Traditional pontoon boats tend to be slow and stable. One could argue that the only thing that the Switch has in common with pontoon boats is the use of the word in its name and multiple hulls.

This is not the St. Johns River accident either. This is actually the largest model of the Sea-Doo Switch Pontoon, the 19-footer. This Switch flipped on the Potomac River at Washington D.C., necessitating the rescue of eight “riders,” as Seadoo calls them.

This image appears to show owners using a pickup truck and a line in an effort to unflip their Switch.

The tame marine media greeted the introduction of the Seadoo Switch with applause. Boating magazine named it 2022 “Boat of the Year.” As a product, it does have appeal. Depending on which model, Switch can carry between five and nine people, has a top speed of over 35 mph and pricing that starts at under $30,000 for the 13-footer. They are cheap, fast and fun.

BRP leveraged its long experience in the PWC market (commonly, jetskis) to create a tri-hulled hybrid propelled by a Rotax water jet. The vessel has a jetski handlebar helm offset to starboard, while the engine mounts in the central hull, which happens to be shaped like that of an oversized jetski. Seat positions are designed to balance the boats, but Sea-Doo touts the ability of owners to re-arrange the furniture somewhat.

The Seadoo Switch as seen from the front.

Unlike a traditional pontoon or tri-toon boat with all same-size hulls, the outer hulls of the Switch are smaller and don’t project as far down into the water as the big one in the middle. This enables the Switch to lean into turns like a jetski. Its jet engine is available in either 170 or 230 horsepower (although the 230 is not an option for the 13-foot model.)

One way to learn about handling characteristics of the Switch is to visit two owner Facebook pages, one of which is “official.” There you will learn that many folks love their Switch; some have gripes about mechanical problems and customer service. Most relevant to this story are the tales of forward flips and near flips and advice on how to not flip.

A Google search will turn up several images of flipped Switch, and not just the shortest model, like the one that was operated by the Florida family in question.

To say “capsize” would be misleading. That’s how we describe it when a sailboat overturns, blown over on its side. According to owner Facebook posts, the Switch flips forward. In sailing terminology, this would be called pitchpoling.

Some owners posted about the need to respect weight limits and distribution, but often accompanied by descriptions of close-calls happening when the throttle lever was released.

“You have to slow down gradually. If you slow down fast, it will bury the nose and you can flip it,” Elisa Stern wrote.

“This happened to me twice. The first day I had it, I had let off the throttle suddenly. Now I reduce speed slowly. Second time, there was a big wave as I was coming into a no-wake zone. If it happens, hit the gas. It is really scary. I’m pretty sure my niece will never get on my boat again,” Kelly Turrietta Young said.

Brian Garrison wrote a primer on how to not flip that was reminiscent of instructions for landing a small plane:

Slow down evenly and gradually. Then when your wake catches up to you, just before it hits, increase gas slightly to counter the push of the wake on the back of the boat, then ease off again. repeat to keep the bow up until the wake evens out and the boat settles. Basically, stopping too fast can cause the momentum of the boat to push the nose down, if you combine that with the push that the boat’s own wake catching up to it, that also causes the nose to dip. Combine that with any waves you may hit, that could further dip the bow. Combine that with too much weight in the front, and you have a bad day.

So, just ease gradually down on the gas and counter the bow dip with small increases in gas to keep the bow up until the boat settles. When showing my wife to drive the boat, she made those mistakes of stopping too fast, and we had way too many people in the front for that. The nose dipped, and luckily we didn’t capsize. I was hanging off the back leaning out over the water like a pirate and yelling for everyone to get to the back of the boat. Thankfully, everyone got there fast enough to bring the nose up. So, yeah, DONT OVERWEIGHT the front and then stop fast.

Moving Ballast?

Another possible factor: Switch outer hulls are not fully filled with foam. The hulls comprise multiple segments whose number determines LOA, whether the hull is 13, 16 or 19 feet long. The segments are purposely not sealed, so water seeps into the hulls, supposedly to add weight and thus stability at rest. The ballast water then flows out through an opening in the back when underway or when hauled out.

Loose Cannon visited a local Sea-Doo dealer to ask about this characteristic. The salesman did not hesitate to acknowledge the boat’s propensity to flip when suddenly decelerating, particularly in choppy water or in combination with a turn. But he said he did not know exactly how much ballast water the outer hulls could hold, noting that it is not specified in any of the manuals or training literature.

A gallon of water weighs 8.34 pounds. Our salesman guessed maybe two gallons. Owner Facebook posts suggested it could be more. A worst case might be 10 gallons per hull.

If a Switch were at rest and then got underway long enough to lose 10 of the 20 gallons out the back, and were then throttled down, a combined 80-plus pounds of water could be sent hurtling forward, filling the empty space and helping to force the bow down.

BRP knows the answer to the question of how much water, but the press office at the Canadian conglomerate did not reply to Loose Cannon’s initial email, which asked whether the company was aware of any fatalities involving the Switch line.

The warning sticker at the Seadoo helm cautions against overloading the boat and to “ensure that weight is evenly and properly distributed,” but it says nothing about the hazards of sudden deceleration. Neither does the owners manual, which does say that capsizing is unlikely: “This watercraft is designed so that it should not turn over easily due to its long and wide dimensions.”

Brian Garrison’s somewhat complicated primer on how to not flip should be considered in the context of the Switch market, some combination of likely jetski and pontoon consumers. Apologies in advance to pontoon-boat readers for this generalization: Pontoon boaters are probably not the most savvy mariners on America’s waterways. Many Switch people are probably first-time boat buyers.

These folks want to get out on the water and have fun with their families on weekends, not to become versed in the nuances of vessel stability.

This is not the Grullon family. This is a Seadoo Switch 13 like they one in the accident. It shows the standard seating arrangement.

Accident on the St. Johns

Vianca’s dad, William Grullon, did not respond to messages either, understandable given the recent trauma. According to the police report, he was among five adults on the 13-footer. Technically, the boat’s five-person capacity had been exceeded because the girl made six, but that would have added only an estimated 22 pounds. The total weight on board may well have been below the 835-pound limit specified by the manufacturer along with the per-person limit.

But, according to witnesses at Black Creek Marina, a stone’s throw from the accident, none of the adults could swim, which is highly unusual for American boaters. They had been speeding back and forth past the no-wake sign out front all day before eventually flipping. Except for the little girl, none was wearing a life jacket.

All of which points to a lack of experience on the water.

It also explains why the adults could not help save the girl because they themselves had to rescued. There was a 911 call, and, when pair of passing Clay County fire & rescue lieutenants responded to the scene, they were taken to the overturned Switch by a boater who had been about to go shrimping.

As it happened, the buoyancy of the girl’s lifejacket had pinned her to the floor of the overturned vessel. Lieutenant Thomas Gill spent so long underwater on a single breath of air that his partner began to think that he too may have drowned, according to news reports. Then, Gill pushed the infant to the surface and waiting hands. “She looked like a ragdoll,” one witness said.

Florida Fish & Wildlife is investigating the accident. That can mean different things. The final report probably won't dwell on design issues.

The investigator may assess blame, or at least establish an accurate sequence of events, based on interviews with Grullon and others on board. That could confirm whether a release of the throttle had preceded the flip, or whether the family found some other, atypical way to get upside down.

The boat overturned between this Minium Wake marker an Knight’s Marina at the confluence of Black Creek and the St. Johns River.

Witnesses reported choppy conditions that day on the St. Johns. Foot-and-half waves may have been a contributing factor, they said.

‘Design Deficiency?’

One of the posters on the Facebook owners page was not an owner. He was doing research to decide whether to buy a Switch. Larry Myers’ farewell to the group was poignant:

I'm crossing the Switch off the possible purchase list. I joined to evaluate the Switch based on first-person commentary. Lots of positives and lots of negatives. I attributed many of the issues to new boat owners, but also some pretty glaring design deficiencies such as the battery configuration. I was alarmed by the reports of capsizing but until today had not seen a first-person report.

My conclusion, despite operator error with weight and distribution, is that there exists a design deficiency with the outer pontoons that requires re-engineering for safety. What that is, I don't know specifically. It might be sealing the pontoons, increasing internal flotation, redesign of the pontoon shape so the boat doesn't have a tendency to dive fatally when outside engineered scope, or baffles to reduce water flow from back to the front, or lift wings on the front of the pontoons limiting down pitch in water. For now, I will move onto options B, C or D, until SeaDoo addresses what I perceive to be safety issues. Good group, Thank you.

The final word goes to a Florida manufacturer who has built all types of recreational vessels at his Gainesville factory over the past 50 years.

“I'm a boatbuilder. In cases like these, I usually give the manufacturer the benefit of the doubt, but I'll say this, nothing being sold as a pontoon boat should capsize on the St. Johns River,” said Ken Fickett, president of Mirage Manufacturing.