Motorboat incident on Lake Starnberg: How dangerous is swimming in Bavarian lakes?

Created: 08/01/2022, 20:16

By: Carina Zimniok, Tobias Gmach, Sophia Oberhuber

A swimmer was run over by a motorboat in Lake Starnberg – the 32-year-old has been missing since then.

How dangerous is it on the Upper Bavarian lakes?

Kempfenhausen - They searched with dogs, with sonar devices, with divers and underwater drones - but on Monday afternoon (August 1st) the rescue workers had to stop the search for the missing man from Munich.

The 32-year-old was run over by a motorboat on Sunday at 2.45 p.m. in Lake Starnberg.

He went under immediately, in front of his friends, who were in the rubber dinghy next to him.

The 64-year-old driver of the motorboat, who was traveling from north to south with his wife, stopped immediately and jumped into the water - but in vain.

Today, Tuesday morning, at 7 a.m., the search for the missing person is to be continued: the police hired a private company with a sonar boat.

Starnberger See: Accidents of this kind happen very rarely

Swimmer collides with motorboat - a rare, tragic accident.

No similar cases have been reported in either of the Upper Bavarian police headquarters in recent years.

The lifeguard confirms that accidents of this kind happened very rarely.

One thing is certain: Driving motor boats in Bavaria is strictly regulated.

Only two Upper Bavarian lakes may be navigated with boats with combustion engines: the Ammersee and the Starnberger See.

The respective district office issues the licenses for both bodies of water - for Lake Starnberg there is a maximum of 250 pieces.

They are in great demand: "The waiting time is at least ten years," says a spokesman.

And anyone who receives a motorboat license automatically loses it after five years.

The limitation is more about environmental protection, not about keeping the number of powerful boats low for safety reasons.

There is no license requirement for boats with an electric motor.

Bavarian lakes: swimmers must keep a distance of 100 meters from the steam jetty

The busier the lakes are, the greater the risk of disaster.

Dangerous situations arise time and again with the steamers of the Bayerische Seenschifffahrt - of course, these accumulate during long periods of good weather.

Michael Grießer has been observing this for a long time, he has been Managing Director of Lake Shipping for eight years.

He says that it's only sometimes teenagers or young adults who jump off the jetty into the water just before the ship lands, as a test of courage or out of recklessness.

Most of the time, swimmers are in danger if they don't get out of the water in time around the jetty that a steamer is approaching.

This is a significant stress factor for the captains: "When you are eight meters above the water, it is very difficult to see such a small head," he says.

Looking for the missing person: Tobias Bucher (left) and Oliver Jauch from the water rescue service.

© Oliver Bodmer

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Actually, the rule is to keep a distance of 100 meters from the steamer jetty - many bathers are not aware of that.

And so, according to Grießer, it happens again and again that steamers cannot dock and have to move on.

Another problem: long-distance swimmers crossing the lake.

Without a support boat or buoy, they are very difficult to spot in the water.

Benjamin Taitsch, Vice-Chairman of the Bavarian Water Rescue Service, advises long-distance swimmers to always pull a signal-colored float behind them.

And Grießer from Lake Shipping says: "We ask the swimmers not to stay on the routes of the steamers and motor boats." They have to keep a distance of 300 meters from the shore.

Starnberger See: Accident is analyzed in detail

The accident on Sunday afternoon happened about 500 meters from the Kempfenhausen bathing area.

So far there is no evidence that the 64-year-old motorboat driver was under the influence of alcohol or drugs.

By order of the Munich II public prosecutor's office, the motorboat was secured and an accident analysis report was ordered.

The Fürstenfeldbruck criminal police are investigating - at the moment not because of a specific allegation, but only as part of a preliminary investigation, as a spokesman for the public prosecutor's office said on request.

The first priority is to find the missing person.

According to Oliver Jauch from the Starnberg water rescue service, the water in the area around the accident site is a maximum of 17 meters deep.

But what can hardly be estimated: the current.

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