Blast off question for TD'S

[Terry Smith]

Why is it that almost all tournaments don't have A set blast off time????????? It's always "SAFE LIGHT" which varies from person to person. Is there A reason why we don't?????

[RipnRog]

Why is it that almost all tournaments don't have A set blast off time????????? It's always "SAFE LIGHT" which varies from person to person. Is there A reason why we don't?????

because safe light is always changing.... early in the year safe light is around 6:30 to 7:00.... this coming weekend it will be around 5:30..... therfore it can not be a set time.

[Terry Smith]

I know that it gets earlier as we get into the summer months. BUT why can't we have A set time? If I remeber right at the Classic they blasted off every day at 7:00 A.M.Why don't we do this?

[kopper_bass]

Terry,
Its all about liability and responsibility.
Cant launch if we cant reasonably see. the tourney org would be liable then if something happened in the darkened launch.

Many lakes also have regulations that requires launch and full speed from safe light only, or 5pmh only if its still dark; or worse no launch at all. nobody is going to launch and go 5mph.

weather conditions play a huge part of it; thus the tentative launch time, but "safe light" designation. Fog, rain, and even just overcast skies turn a 5:30am launch into slightly later go time.

Conversely, if you go conservative and say no launch until 6am period, but Sunday (2nd day) is a blue bird sky, then you'll have fisherman sitting in perfectly good daylight at 5:15am wondering why we didnt launch and go, waiting on 6am to show up.
not good either!

hope that makes sense.

Kopper

[Steve Perkins]

I like the set blast off time, All the FLW events ive fished had a set takeoff time.

[Terry Smith]

I like the set blast off time, All the FLW events ive fished had a set takeoff time.

This is what I'm talking about.

[kopper_bass]

Steve,
FLW does try to identify and set a conservative start time, and voiding any weather, they do start on time. Their start time is always beyond "first light" though and it is still a "pending" situation based on the weather. You have been fortunate though to NOT be at a tourney that gets hit with heavy rain, fog, or some other weather that would then delay the start. They will always delay for those reasons and their start time is not "absolute".

Terry,
There is no reason that any organization can't do like they did with Bassmasters; they just choose not too. Bassmasters did that for the spectators and fans and TV coverage. It was well documented that the fisherman didnt care for it, but of course at that level they just went with it - what else could they do?

I think the reason most of the "other" tourney orgs dont do that kind of thing is simple - fisherman dont like it. With orgs like WON, A/C, Federation, FPT or Western Rookie League, its all about catering to the fisherman and the paying customer; and competing against the other organizations for that paying customer. I dont think any of the lesser orgs would get a good following if they adopted this kind of launch. Fisherman would just start going to the other orgs that had early start times.

Everyone knows that there's always a good bite at the crack of dawn; sometimes thats the only bite you get for those bigger fish. Nobody wants to be sitting at the dock waiting for X time, when that bite is possibly happening.

I know i wouldnt want to be doing that.

Kopper

[Brian Linehan]

[JJCJR]

At one of the last FLW tournaments, they set a blast-off time at 7:30. Sunrise was at 5:30. Is that what you want?

For the WON Pro events we tell fishermen when check-in time at the lake begins, get everybody in the water and depart when it's safe. We might give the fishermen attending the team meeting an estimated blast-off time but there can always be variables. We as the tournament staff are there for you.....

At Mohave we were willing to wait until the wind died down on the second day, but I have to hand it to the fishermen, everyone team (one pro withdrew because he though it was unsafe to fish that day) was ready to blast off at 5:20 even though there was the chance we'd be playing "bob" for a good part of the morning. The fishermen were ready, we saw a "window of opportunity (5:38)" to send everyone out...and the rest is history.

As a tournament director we send fishermen out when it's deemed safe. Fishermen in pro events, who have been on a body of water prefishing before tournaments day, know when it's safe to go. Again we're here for you to give you as much fishable time on the water that we can.

[WackySenko]

We have all been in tournaments on the Delta when we were launched alittle prior to safe light or safe conditions. Most of the time it is not a problem. One time it was so foggy when we blasted off that I started fishing a very short way out of the No Wake area. I stayed close to the tullies and out of boat traffic. There were guys getting on plane and blasting across Frank's using GPS. About an hour later it was still foggy and we almost got run over by some idiot doing about 35 along the tullies in another area. He had to turn so sharp not to hit us that he put quite some water into our boat. That day I chased the fog going south until about 9:30 when it finally burned off.
The Launch at 'safelight' is fine with me.

[RipnRog]

while it sound like a nice idea and man the extra sleep would be nice.... If my set time was say 7:00 like FLW the guys would be pretty pissed blasting off at that time tomorrow and boy would they complain on the forums.....

[ash]

I like the set blast off time, All the FLW events ive fished had a set takeoff time.

This is what I'm talking about.

Our Club posts the Civil Twilight times as a tool to reference blast off, so that everyone is aware of what time Official Sunrise is, now of course its teh TD's discretion to let the flights go that morning due to severe weather impacts...but for the most part we be blastin off.