Federal officials check houseboat exhaust at Lake Mead

Wednesday, Jan. 24, 2001 | 10:32 a.m.

SUN STAFF AND WIRE REPORTS

Federal researchers are at Lake Mead this week testing carbon monoxide levels of houseboats.

Officials of the National Institute for Occupational Safety and Health have conducted similar tests at two other popular houseboat destinations -- Lake Cumberland in Kentucky and Lake Powell in Arizona -- where they have found dangerously high levels of carbon monoxide, an invisible, odorless gas.

The tests come in the wake of a federal government study released in November that found seven deaths and 74 injuries related to houseboat carbon monoxide exhaust on Lake Powell during the 1990s.

No deaths have been reported at Lake Mead in the past five years from houseboat exhaust although more than 600 of the craft -- both by private owners and renters -- operate in the Lake Mead National Recreation Area from Laughlin to Echo Bay, National Park Service spokesman Bert Byers said today.

Two incidents of people complaining about ill effects after houseboat trips prompted the rental companies to send the boaters to area hospitals for checkups, Byers said.

Two houseboat manufacturers who rent boats at Lake Mead -- Fun Country Marine Industries and Pacific Boat -- asked the researchers to test their houseboats.

"NIOSH seems surprised that we called, but our customers want some answers and we want to know, too," said Darla Cook, director of sales and marketing for Forever Resorts, based in Scottsdale and owner of Fun Country Marine Industries.

They have made 309 houseboats of different designs since the early 1990s, and the company wants to know if some designs are safer than others.

On Tuesday at Callville Bay Marina, institute researchers surveyed and took photos of about a dozen different designs of houseboats docked at the marina. They did extensive tests of four styles of boats made by Fun Country.

Later this week they will move to Echo Bay to look at Pacific Boats rented by Seven Crown Resorts.

The final results of the Lake Mead tests are expected to be ready in March or April.

"If there is any retrofit that needs to be made for safety, we would do that for our boats," Cook said.