Vessel 1 was towing the two girls on a tube in Dry Creek on Tim's Ford Lake.  Vessel 2 was riding along near vessel 1.  The two girls yelled to the operator of vessel 1 to stop, Operator1 stopped vessel 1 and was talking with the two girls on the tube.  Operator2 headed vessel 2 towards the tube and started to slow down.  When Operator2 got near the tube he pulled the kill switch on vessel 2 so that he could hear what operator1 and the the girls were saying.  As Operator2 got close to the tube he realized that he was going to hit the tube and tried to turn away, not realizing that he couldn''t steer the vessel with the engine off.  Before he could react, the front of vessel 2 struck the tube and the two girls on it. Operator2 and occupants of both vessels estimated that vessel 2 was going less than 10 mph when it struck the tube.  The front of vessel 2 struck tuber1 in the back of the head/neck and struck tuber2 on the side of the head.  At Southern Middle Tennessee Medical Center the ER doctor advised that tuber1 needed to be taken to Erlanger Hospital in Chattanooga to have surgery because of a fracture in the C-2 bone in the back of her neck. The SMTMC ER doctor/nurses also advised that tuber2was fine other than the bruises.
WINCHESTER                    