The squall is turning the lake and your day of fishing into a wild place.
Your 14 foot boat suddenly slides down a wave and broaches.
You turn on your motor and throw your weight to the high side.
The boat does not capsize, but a sickening and frightening amount of water comes aboard.
Lunch, tackle boxes and any bass or walleye fish that you have caught earlier slosh around in several inches of water.
The closest land can be several miles away.
The wind is already blowing at 30 miles per hour and getting ever increasingly stronger.
You may have your cell phone.
Yet out in the woods and far away from civilization it may not pick up any useful signal to help you out.
The waves are getting bigger now.
And steeper as well.
You want to bail, but it would be too dangerous to take your hand off the tiller.
Another wave sends the boat careening and you struggle just to stay on course.
It's a sad fact that if fisherman planned ahead on how to react in such a situation and known how to handle their boats in such a scenario or emergency most will back it back to shore, all to fish yet another day or weekend.
First of all if you are on open water when high winds strike, consider that you have two immediate objectives.
Interestingly or as a fisherman may consider a challenge - these two immediate objectives on the boat in the squall may or may not even complement each other.
First and foremost maintain the boats watertight "integrity".
Step two is to get to safety as fast as humanely possible.
Always remember and keep in the foremost of your mind's thoughts that as long as you can keep water out of your boat, you will be in no danger.
Sure this fact seems obvious to even an inexperienced boater or fisherman yet it is not easy to forget when the wild winds and waves are turning your fears on edge.
It is essential not to panic and do something foolish.
Always try to remember that though water may slop on board regularly, that as long as you can rid of this water faster than you come into the boat that you can always "weather the blow" or "weather the storm".
As the waves increase, your boat can protect you best if you heave to.
This means to head into the seas and go as slow as possible.
If may be necessary to cut the power or back slightly to keep a wave from breaking into the boat.
Keep the bow high.
Even a very small boat can surmount incredible waves with this method.
What water may come in may be bailed out.
Once you can see how your boat handles the storm start moving slowly ahead.
Speed will tend to drive the bow deeper into the waves and bring more water aboard.
When you get control in high waves and see that you can remain afloat, consider then the second objective - that is getting to safety.
In most cases this is simply getting to the nearest shore - whether it be lake shore or river bank.
It may be that you can speed to safety before big waves have to a chance to build up.
A great deal depends on wind velocity, wind direction and other variables but on any large body of water in squall winds of 35- 60 miles per hour; your escape time will certainly be measured in minutes.
You can depend on no more than 5 minutes before the wind whips up the seas to such heights that you no longer can run at high speed in any direction that you choose.
Therefore, if you have more good sense you will never be, or stay more than 5 minutes out from shore in any kind of threatening weather.
Five minutes in a canoe means less than a mile.
In a fast runabout, three miles may be a safe distance.
Speed generally means safety.
But always remember this: waves will grow quickly and increasingly cut your speed.
Getting to shore depends on many factors.
You may even have negative speed over the bottom.
Even though the boat is headed into waves under power, it may actually be drifting backwards.
Or you may be able to make slow but steady forward speed and still keep water out of your craft.
If this is impossible, your next safest maneuver is to turn and run downwind with the waves.
But here again, there is the danger of broaching.
As your boat drives over a wave , and the bow digs in, the following wave hits your stern and throws it sideways , perhaps even capsizing the boat...
What you must do is to time your speed to the speed of the waves.
You attempt to get on the "back" of the wave and stay in troughs between waves.
Err on the side of going too slowly.
Let the waves overtake the boat, rather than outgunning it.
It is better to take water over the small area of stern than to broach and expose the whole side of the boat.
This is why it can be said that running across the seas or quartering them downwind is downright dangerous.
In the end it's all about safety before and during a fishing jaunt.
It pays to be cautious and pay attention to weather conditions.
If caught in a squall your first goal should be to maintain your boat's watertight integrity.
Your second goal is next to get to safety.
It might be said that the primary marine rule of "sailing" in a squall is not to be caught in a squall in the first place.
That being said if you are going to be where the fish are waiting to be caught you will find yourself in this predicament from time to time.
Be prepared and ready to face the challenge.