Letter from Doug Markham <'TK><
This was sent to me and Rick from TWRA .
Rick,
Attached below is Bill Dance's uncorrupted letter to the Corps.
You will see in the thread that Leslie Reasons of Bill Dance Outdoors
gives us our blessing to use it as we please.
For your info., too, I received a package from the Corps yesterday after an FOIA request.
I wanted to know what the "10 near misses and 1 serious injury" were that LTC Delapp used
to tell our press dams were unsafe. He used this information every time he talked about the three
deaths below dams since 2009 when all boaters were wearing life jackets to indicate that life
jackets don't work. We now know the truth behind those three deaths (jackets in two the three deaths weren't used properly so in effect were really worn).
But we didn't know the truth about the other dramatic sounding statistics.
The information I got yesterday shows that every person in the near misses had on life jackets and survived.
The one serious injury was caused by Corps negligence or contractor negligence. Apparently a crane was
dropping debris from one side of Barkley Dam to another and dropped a load either on or near a boat, slamming
one of the passengers into the vessel's windshield. He DIDN"T EVEN go into the water. This ended in a lawsuit
where the Corps settled out of court. This is why the Corps does not want us down there----liability.
Bottom line, life jackets do work, but this commander has mislead our press and our congressional folks. We need
to find out about and weaken his other argument--that the 1996 Corps policy has tied his hands and he is
only doing his job to bring the Nashville District into compliance. I expect it has a weakness or I don't believe he would not have
relied so much of the safety charade.
Thanks for all of your work. Contacting press and congressmen prior to Feb. 5 is key to helping us turn this thing around.
Doug M.
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