South Australia's coroner has called on the state government to introduce some of the country's strictest mandatory lifejacket laws, after findings handed down from an inquest into eight deaths across four separate boating tragedies between 2024 and 2025.
Coroner David Whittle delivered his findings on Thursday, concluding a formal inquiry that examined whether there was a systemic failure in how lifejackets are used under South Australia's marine safety regime. His central finding was stark: not one of the eight men who died had been wearing a lifejacket at the time of their respective accidents, according to 9News.
The first incident occurred on March 25, 2024, when Paul Eckert, 73, Thomas Eckert, 40, and Alan Bottrill, 71, drowned after a wave capsized their vessel at Buffalo Reef, approximately 55 kilometres east of Port Lincoln. Thomas Eckert's brother Danny and a 13-year-old nephew survived by swimming to the reef and were winched to safety the following day. The coroner described the subsequent rescue operation as "comprehensive and well-organised", noting that witnesses had established the wave was nearly three metres higher than the boat.
On August 14, 2024, the bodies of Kangaroo Island professional fishermen David Neave and Rodney Ingram were found near their overturned vessel off Cape Cassini, hours after the alarm was raised when thick fog moved in. Mr Whittle found that capsize was "a plausible and likely scenario", with fog having obscured landmarks and the boat possibly drifting close to a reef before a wave struck without warning.
The third tragedy took place on November 30, 2024, when fisherman Peter Martin, 77, drowned off Cape Finniss near Elliston on the Eyre Peninsula. Mr Whittle found his boat most likely capsized when a cray pot snagged on the sea floor during retrieval, possibly as a result of the pot rope becoming caught in the winching mechanism.
The fourth incident occurred on January 6, 2025, in Rivoli Bay near Beachport, in the state's South-East. Victor Kent, 69, and Roger Walker, 82, died after their vessel capsized while they were checking cray pots.
Across all four incidents, the coroner noted that while it could not be said with certainty that lifejackets would have saved every life, their use "would have given each person at the very least a strong chance of survival".
A call for national leadership on marine safety
Under current laws in South Australia and most other Australian states, lifejackets are mandatory only on powered vessels less than 4.8 metres in length, and must be worn at all times by children aged 12 and under. Mr Whittle recommended that South Australia raise this threshold to seven metres, a change he estimated would bring 93 per cent of registered boats under a mandatory wearing obligation.
The coroner went further, recommending that offshore fishermen and rescue services consider equipping lifejackets with personal locator beacons capable of GPS broadcasting, to improve the speed and precision of search and rescue responses when vessels are lost at sea.
The recommendations touch on a longstanding tension in maritime safety policy: how to balance individual freedom and personal responsibility against the state's interest in preventing foreseeable deaths. Fishing communities, particularly in regional and remote coastal areas, have historically resisted mandatory equipment requirements, citing the practical demands of working on the water and the argument that experienced mariners are best placed to assess their own risk.
Those concerns deserve a fair hearing. Regulatory overreach in industries already under significant economic pressure can carry real costs, both financial and cultural. South Australia's commercial fishing sector, which operates across exposed and often treacherous coastal waters, is populated by experienced professionals who understand conditions that desk-bound regulators may not.
At the same time, the evidence presented to this inquest is difficult to dismiss. Eight men died in four unrelated incidents over the space of ten months. Each capsize was sudden and, in most cases, offered little or no opportunity for the victims to reach safety equipment stored elsewhere on the vessel. The State Coroner's findings do not suggest negligence or recklessness on the part of those who died; they suggest that the margin between survival and drowning, when a boat overturns without warning, is often measured in seconds.
The marine safety framework in South Australia, as in most jurisdictions, has historically lagged behind the evidence base for lifejacket effectiveness. Research collated by Royal Life Saving Australia consistently shows that drowning rates among recreational and commercial boaters are disproportionately high among those not wearing a lifejacket at the time of an incident, even among strong swimmers in familiar waters.
Whether the South Australian government acts on Mr Whittle's recommendations remains to be seen. Coronial findings carry significant moral authority but no binding legislative force; the decision rests with the state's political leadership. What is clear from this inquest is that the current threshold, a threshold that left all eight of these men without any legal obligation to wear a lifejacket, merits serious reconsideration. The evidence for raising it is substantial, the cost of inaction has already been paid eight times over, and reasonable reform need not strip working fishermen of their autonomy or dignity.