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It takes a special kind of person to get aboard a boat that’s capable of traveling at hundreds of miles per hour. Two experienced pilots did exactly that during a competition at Lake Havasu in Arizona over the weekend, and they were lucky to walk away with relatively minor injuries due to what unfolded while they were attempting to set a record.
Humans have spent millennia using boats to navigate the world’s waters. The dugout canoes and rafts that were the first form of aquatic transportation were propelled by oars before people realized they could use sails to harness the power of the wind, and those two methods were the go-to before the first motorboats began their inaugural voyages in Europe toward the end of the 1800s.
In 1978, Ken Darby set a record that still stands to this day when he hopped behind the wheel of the Spirit of Australia, the jet-powered wooden powerboat he built in his backyard before hitting a top speed of 317.596 MPH on the waters of the reservoir of Blowering Dam in New South Wales.
Multiple people have died while attempting to surpass that mark, and while two men who participated in a competition in Arizona over the weekend weren’t trying to top it, they were lucky to walk away with their lives after things took a turn for their worse while trying to break another record.
Each year, Lake Havasu—a 42-square-mile expanse located near the California border—hosts the Desert Storm Shootout, a multi-day event that features plenty of souped-up powerboats doing their thing on the water.
On Saturday, two unidentified members of the Freedom One racing team boarded America One, a custom 388 Skater equipped with two 4,000-horsepower engines, in the hopes of breaking the Desert Storm Shootout Speed record of 206 MPH.
They were able to do exactly that by peaking at 210 MPH before things took a terrifying turn when the boat flew out of the water and twirled in the air before it came crashing back down as rescuers raced to the scene.
According to AZ Family, one of the pilots suffered a broken collarbone in addition to some damage to his ribs, while the other ended up with a fractured knee.
It’s believed windy conditions in the area contributed to the mishap (there were gusts of around 30 MPH observed at the time), but a spokesperson said both men are in “great spirits” and believes they—as well as the boat—will make a full recovery.