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I was bass fishing a local lake Saturday with a friend in my Tarpon 14. After a few hours we were drifting parallel to dam and I was fan casting to the rocks. Winds were fairly light so the drift was slow to moderate. Suddenly I was tilting left and before I could shift my weight or reach for the high side, I had flipped over. I don't remember leaning left, was not reaching around, just casting and drifting. The whole thing was a total surprise and sudden- actually shocking as I am really not sure what lead up to the roll.
I was wearing my PDF, breathable waders, a wading jacket. I simply swam the boat over to the dam, flipped it back over and recovered most of my stuff with the help of my friend Red except for the 3 rods that headed south immediately. I am still trying to figure out how this happened so quickly and if there was any corrective action that could have saved me from the flip. Any suggestions guys?
Here is what I took away from that cold experience:
1 Always wear a PDF!
2 Don't wear cotton (yes I had cotton pants and long an short sleeve cotton shirts under the wading jacket) in less that warm/ hot weather.
3 Tie it down or attach it to the boat!
4 Pack a dry bag with spare clother.
5 If you don't need it above, store it in a hatch (there was no reason to have a first aid kit in my crate).
6 Either lash the rods to the boat or use rod floats.
7 Learn deep water re-entry.
8 Always wear a PDF!

Besides the loss of a couple of cheap rods, a nice Lew's bait caster and a couple of cheap Shimano spinning reels, a lesson as learned and my bruised ego will mend!

Are you tall? what about your weight? I know the Tarpons are not that wide, I had a similar experience in a Hobie Revolution 11ft. I bent over to one side and next thing I knew I was in the bay. I am 5.10 210LB. Never had an issue in my Hobie Pro Angler.

I have the Tarpon 140, but never have had an unplanned exit. Like a lot of accidents, it could have been a series of small things that added up to a big thing. Maybe the overall load was just slightly skewed to one side, an anchor here, an ice chest there, and then forward or aft too much. Maybe the CG was just a little higher than usual for whatever reason. Maybe your body position was off center without you realizing it. Sometimes, I catch myself not being centered in the seat, but off to one side without immediately realizing it. It's all just physics playing out in the end, right?

When I load out my kayak, I try to put whatever heavy stuff I load low and centered in the kayak. Dont let the kayak get aft or bow heavy. I periodically check the area inside the hatch(if there is one) to make sure water hasn't gotten in somehow. Water inside the body of the hull will potentially make a kayak unstable.

Glad you made it out okay. It happens. My fishing bud, a long time kayaker, just one day suddenly ended up in the water much like you described. I was 30 feet away and there wasn't any waves or wind or current to account for him falling in. He didn't know what he did wrong. He wasn't goofing off or standing or drinking or anything. It just suddenly happened.

That happened to me years ago in my tarpon 160. I was on Fayette lake and it was handling really wobbly-like. Finally caught a sideways wave and flipped. Lost a rod holder and some pliers but that's it fortunately. When I got to shore I realized I'd forgotten to close the drain valve before launching. The water coming in had created enough weight and ballast to make it sit low and slosh around all unstable like. Did you check your valve? I'm phobic about rechecking before I launch ever since.


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I know exactly what your talking about , it's happens so quick. I rolled my ride x115 a few weeks ago. Very similar situation but the water was getting rough where I was. I could not believe how fast it went , looking back I remember I had my anchor, extra rod, two tackle boxes ,stake out pole and first aid kit all on the left side of the kayaK there was also my kayak safety flag with a extended pole holding a U.S. flag on the left side .Lesson learned here was balance your kayak loads and like you stated always wear your PFD , lash everything, I also started to use rod floats after this rollover. Glad to hear to you are ok and learned from bad experiences. Stay safe

Not sure you were doing it, but one thing I always do on the rare occasion I'm fishing from my kayak, is hang my feet over each side of the kayak as ballast. In some kayaks, this is not comfortable and if your kayak has a seat with a high and low setting, it doesn't work as well with the seat set in the high position. But in the 140 I have used, it works fine

Were you casting when you flipped? I flipped once years ago while casting from right to left because my weight shifted and the momentum carried me over. I now cast back to front (mostly) while I'm on the kayak.

Yaklash wrote:Not sure you were doing it, but one thing I always do on the rare occasion I'm fishing from my kayak, is hang my feet over each side of the kayak as ballast. In some kayaks, this is not comfortable and if your kayak has a seat with a high and low setting, it doesn't work as well with the seat set in the high position. But in the 140 I have used, it works fine

Aren't you like 6'7"? Not sure the above works for ordinary mortals.

karstopo wrote:

Yaklash wrote:Not sure you were doing it, but one thing I always do on the rare occasion I'm fishing from my kayak, is hang my feet over each side of the kayak as ballast. In some kayaks, this is not comfortable and if your kayak has a seat with a high and low setting, it doesn't work as well with the seat set in the high position. But in the 140 I have used, it works fine

Aren't you like 6'7"? Not sure the above works for ordinary mortals.

Everything is relative, just think about how much leg I have dangling in the water.

Thanks guys- really good observations. I am 6 ft, about 195. The hull as dry and the load fairly balanced, I did have my small anchor on the side that went down but the balancing comments make good sense. I may have actually been casting, it happened so fast I'm not sure. Question- if I had grabbed the high quickly, would it have stopped the roll or would I simply gone over the the opposite side?