This accident occurred on falls lake at rollingview marina in durham county.  A few minutes before 5:00pm on june 16, 2013, operator1 was operating her pontoon boat with 8 passengers on board and pulled in to refuel at the marina.  She pulled to the pump on the left when facing the marina.  At 5:00pm, she began to pull away from the pump she began to reverse away and was moving backwards parallel with the dock and parked boats.  The rear of the boat began to drift towards the parked boats.  At this time, the operator said she began to panic and put the boat in forward gear.  When she did this, the wheel was turned to the right and she gave the engine too much throttle.  As a result, the front of her pontoon hit a parked pontoon which belongs to the marina damaging both vessels. also, the parked boat was pushed into the floating dock that it was tied to.  The frame of the dock finger and main walkway were bent from the impact.  It does not appear that impairment was involved in any way in this accident and there were no injuries.  The causes of this accident are operator inexperience and negligent operation.  The operator of vessel 1, operator1, was charged with reckless and negligent operation of a motorboat.  There were no other charges issued.
DURHAM