Wheelchair on a boat?

Anybody aware of an easy way to get a person in a wheel chair on/in a boat? Preferably not a pontoon boat, and less than 24 feet. This may be an impossible task. No customization is possible for any docks.

Unfortunately, a lot of getting my sister around consists of bodily lifting her, moving the chair to the new location, and then putting her down in the chair.

At the risk of sounding facetious, what about an engine hoist?

In reply to mtn :

Can the boat be modified for a sling hoist?

Other than that, carry.   Choose your docks carefully. 

In reply to Duke :

In the rehab hospital they had a glorified engine hoist with a canvas sling to get patients in and out of the pool. I don’t know how hard a boat would be.  

How mobile the person is will determine how difficult this will be. Depending on the ailment you may have luck checking with a support group or rehab facility.  The wife’s stroke group gave us some good workarounds for when she needs a wheelchair and they have come up with ways for people to do all kinds of activities with loss of mobility.  A quick phone call or email may get you some pretty good answers.  

In reply to SVreX :

I was assuming the hoist would stay on the dock, and you would return to the same location for retrieval.  But it could be mounted to the boat itself.

My wife took care of an elderly woman that was quite large and she had an invalid hoist for her. This may be an idea you can start with?

In reply to Wally and Troglodyte:

Those are the “sling hoists” I referred to. Also used in pools.  But they require permanent mounting to something. 

OP said no customization of any docks. So I suggested mounting on the boat. 

If you just need to safely move the person on or off the boat, your best bet would be, at the risk of offending the person, a Shamu Stretcher. Yes, it was named after that Shamu. It’s a heavy canvas tarp with straps sewn into it and handles along the edge. It’s like a hammock with handles. You will need at least four people to use it safely. There is a cheaper version called a Mega Mover. 

In reply to Wally :

That’s called a Hoyer Lift. 

I spend a lot of time and energy moving people at work. 

For sailboats you can use a halyard and a bosuns chair on a job sheet winch.   

How much height difference are we talking about? Could you use a sheet of plywood like a ramp? Or maybe a set of truck loading ramps seesaw style with some helpers?

RevRico said:

How much height difference are we talking about? Could you use a sheet of plywood like a ramp? Or maybe a set of truck loading ramps seesaw style with some helpers?

Short answer is no, we can't. Too steep for any of the current applications. 

I need to get my FIL to sell his two boats, as neither of them make any sense right now, and maybe go down to one boat. But even there I don't think 1 boat makes any sense anymore. Hard to tell that to someone though.

There are portable sling lifts that look like a small engine hoist but they need a solid surface under them throughout the transfer so they wont work here.   

Can the chair fit in the boat? There are ramps for that purpose but it seems like the trouble would be getting the chair down into the seating area with a person in it.

There are lifts available for boats. 

If I was in need of a wheelchair boat, I'd take a serious look at a Carolina Skiff.

They are insanely stable, so a lift could be mounted at one corner.  They can be had with a open floor plan and a flat floor to make maneuvering a chair easier. 

this is in the UK.. but something similar could probably be built or modified from a jonboat

wheelyboats

Gang plank.

Whatever solution you come up with, please do a few practice runs with someone significantly heavier than her first to validate the method.

In reply to Woody :

Thank you. i was drawing a blank on the name. 

Depending on the height of the boat relative to the dock you may be able to slide them from the wheelchair to a regular chair.  While she had both legs hurt we had a piece of polyurethaned wood that bridges teh gap between the wheelchair and a regular chair, car, ect. You would likely have to make one as I doubt they come long enough to transfer to a boat but it's a thought.  If they can stand at all moving between two chairs works pretty well to go from place to place too, so if you can get close to the dock wheeling them to the side of the boat, swinging their legs over into thh boat, and then helping them stand and pivot to a seat may work as well. 

Toyman01 said:

There are lifts available for boats. 

If I was in need of a wheelchair boat, I'd take a serious look at a Carolina Skiff.

They are insanely stable, so a lift could be mounted at one corner.  They can be had with a open floor plan and a flat floor to make maneuvering a chair easier. 

with the carolina skiff, like the wheelyboats I posted about, you could cut the bow to make a "landing ramp" that not only makes the liftover height lower, but could be used as a built in ramp.

Don't buy the Achille Lauro brand boat wheelchair

Stepson has a Boston Whaler that is a former Navy dive boat.  Has a section about 3' wide just above the waterline that lifts out to allow retrieval of divers.  If you could make that kind of modification to the boat, you might be able to move the boat away from the dock and use a ramp.

A lot of the bigger boats I see here in S FL have Jet Skis on them. Must be some type of rotating sling hoist engine crane type of thing to put them in the water, perhaps could look at those.

Try searching disabledsportsusa there is some equipment linked on their web site

In reply to AngryCorvair :

Thank you, I’ve been trying for a tasteful Leon Klinghoffer comment and failing.