RedactedNarrative: Received a report of a male who was struck by a propeller on Lake Winnebago.   The reporting party indicated that the leg was bleeding severely and that they were approximately one half to three quarters of a mile to the north of the mouth of the river.  They indicated that they were occupying a red and white deck boat.  The GPS coordinates associated with the 911 call indicated that they were at -88.456290 longitude and 43.810934 latitude.  
  The injured passenger was on the rear swim platform pale in color and was visibly shaking.   He was in a seated position and his legs were in front of him.  Officer observed that on his right leg there was a t-shirt wrapped around his upper thigh and it appeared that it had been applied in a tourniquet style fashion.
    
  Owner and operator stated that the boat was relatively new to them, however, they were experienced boaters having been boating on a regular basis for over 35 years.  They indicated that they had gotten the boat some time ago and it was in need of work.   June 12 was only the second time that they had operated the boat on the water since it had been repaired to operable conditions. While the boat was running, but in neutral the Injured passenger ran from the front of the boat towards the back of the boat and jumped off.  He went under the surface of the water and resurfaced.   When he resurfaced he was yelling in pain and saying "shut the boat off, shut the boat off'.  With this they then called 911.  In observing the boat as well as all occupants of the boat the Officer did not observe any indicators of alcohol consumption. The Operator did inform me that she is not an experienced boat operator.   She did not believe that she had put the boat in gear at any point but given the quick succession of events she was uncertain as to what exactly she had done with regards to putting the boat in gear or not immediately after the Injured Passenger was struck by the propeller.  They did inform me that they had all been wearing their life jackets at the time that the accident occurred.   Another passenger had removed his life jacket to jump into the water to assist the Injured person.
  Upon follow-up the Officer met with the Injured person via phone and was informed that he had suffered lacerations to his leg that had damaged his calf muscle as well as some tendons.   He informed me that the recovery time was going to be two or more weeks.   The Injured person shared with the Officer his account of what had happened.   He said that they were sitting stationary on Lake Winnebago with the boat running.  He jumped off the boat in a cannonball style fashion.   He said that he did jump off the rear of the boat, he went under the water and when he went to resurface he found that the boat was between him and surface.   He was uncertain as to when exactly the propeller struck his leg.  He did indicate that he had hit the boat and the propeller at one time.  The pain did not really set in until after he had come out from underneath the boat and surfaced.   He said that he did observe his leg and that there was severe tissue damage on his leg.  It was at that point that he told the Operator to "shut the boat off' and he instructed them to call 911.  At this point he said that he was bleeding severely. Another passenger did remove his PFD and jumped into the water, swam over to him and helped him maintain his head above water and assisted him in getting to the rope that led from the boat to the tube.  The Injured person used the rope to pull himself back to the boat.  Once back to the swim platform the Injured Person struggled to get onto the swim platform 
  The Officer asked about the condition of the boat.  He did indicate that they had done work on it recently and it was kind of finicky in achieving neutral where the propeller would stop spinning. He said that there was a trigger mechanism on the throttle that needed to be depressed in order to move it from the neutral position and into the forward position.  He said that in order to get the propeller to stop after putting it into the forward  position you would actually have to move it past neutral and into reverse and then from reverse to neutral in order for the propeller to stop spinning.   He said that he was certain that the boat was in the neutral position when he jumped off the boat and that he felt that the propeller was just spinning despite it being in the neutral position when he did jump off and then was subsequently struck by the propeller.   The Injured person  is expected to make a full recovery from his injuries.
  The Officer determined the Primary Cause of the Incident as:  Decision of victim to jump off vessel while it was running, and Secondary Cause:  Inexperience/unfamiliarity with boat of operator