INSTALLING A TRANSOM SWIM PLATFORM

A transom swim platform with a boarding ladder adds safety and convenience.

- Jim Hendricks

Today, new boats are required to meet American Boat and Yacht Council Standard H-41 to provide (and I am paraphrasing here) a means of unassisted reboarding that is accessible to and deployable by a person in the water.

For safety, this makes a lot of sense, particularly if a boater falls overboard from a vessel with tall gunwales that make it impossible to clamber back over the side. Instead, he or she can deploy a boarding ladder or other reboarding system to climb back in the boat more easily.

However, a fair number of boats on the water today were built before the establishment of ABYC Standard H-41 in 2014; thus, some older vessels-particularly outboard boats with cutout transoms-might not meet this requirement.

To be clear, this is not a legal requirement on older boats, but it is a good idea. Fortunately, there ways to add compliant reboarding systems, and one of the most popular for outboard-powered boats is the Garelick model 19536 transom platform with a telescoping, two-step stainless-steel boarding ladder.

The ladder retracts to stow under the 18-inch-wide-by15-inch-long polyethylene platform and is secured with a snap on a web strap. To deploy, the swimmer unsnaps the strap, pulls out and folds down the ladder, then uses the handhold and ladder to step up and into the boat. Here's how to install this boarding system on an outboard-powered boat with an older-style cutout transom.