Memorial Day kicks off a busy boating season

LOWNDES COUNTY, Miss. (WCBI) – Memorial Day Weekend is the unofficial start to summer, which also means it’s the kick off for boating season.

The holiday weekend is one of the busiest for boat traffic and for the Mississippi Department of Wildlife, Fisheries, and Parks Conservation Officers.

Conservation officers do boating enforcement throughout the year, but Memorial Day weekend is when water activity really kicks off.

In Lowndes County, it means all hands on deck and long days for the Wildlife officers assigned to this area.

Memorial Day Weekend means the boats are hitting the water.

“Is this yall’s first day out this weekend?”

“Yes sir.”

Boaters aren’t the only ones making waves this holiday weekend.

Conservation officers have one thing on their minds while patrolling up and down the waterway, safety.

“Constant awareness. Out on the water is a lot different than being out on the road. You’ve got multiple angles people can be coming from, different risks, different hazards you have to be aware of. Whoever is operating that vessel needs to maintain constant awareness at all times and be considerate of other people,” says Mississippi Department of Wildlife, Fisheries, and Parks Conservation Officer, Corporal Carroll Speights.

That also means checking for life jackets and making sure everyone is following all laws.

“We had very good compliance last year with life jackets, not a whole lot of safety issues going on. We’re very proud of everybody out there. This year, we’re just trying to keep that record going and make sure that we have plenty of visibility out on the waterway and people are continuing to be safe.”

Speights says conservation officers learn something new each year the busy boating season rolls in.

“One thing that I am real big about is, you know, if you’re going to be out after dark, or expect to be out at dark, make sure you do a check on your navigational lights. That’s one of our primary citations that come up is from people traveling at night. They don’t check their lights beforehand and when they get out there and turn them on, they don’t work. So, definitely do a function test on those before you get out on the water.”

This is Private Joshua Stoll’s first time patrolling the TomBigbee during Memorial Day weekend.

“Traffic count, probably yeah, we have not seen, I have not seen this kind of traffic out here. Like I said, I was in Texas all last year training, so the traffic count, 42 boats on one beach, they were just packed. There was very little space. They had other boats, they were having go find other beaches to put up on.”

The new season brings a new danger, courtesy of the spring floods.

“Well, with the flooding this year, we’ve seen a lot of sand bars that weren’t here this time last year, so hopefully, folks are taking it a little bit slow. We found a couple that weren’t there last year. We found some stumps that weren’t there last year.”

Conservation officers say they want everyone to have fun, but to stay safe while doing it.

The total number of citations written this holiday weekend hasn’t been released yet.