Go-fast Boat
Sleek, silent killers of the sea that carried empires to ruin.
via Wikipedia: Go-fast boat · see source
A go-fast boat is a small, fast powerboat designed with a long, narrow platform and a planing hull. Depending on definitions used, it is either a speedboat (synonymously) or a certain type of speedboat. When the United States banned the sale of alcohol in the early twentieth century, these boats were used in "rum-running", transferring illegal liquor from larger vessels waiting outside US territorial waters to the mainland. Their high speed enabled them to avoid interception by law enforcement. The present conception of such boats is based largely on designs by Donald Aronow for offshore powerboat racing in the 1960s. During this period, these boats were also used by drug smugglers to transfer drugs across the Caribbean to the United States.
Lore & Background
Go-fast boats are also called cigarette boats or cigar boats—references to their hull shape, to the items that they are (archetypally) used to smuggle (see Illicit cigarette trade and Cuban cigar), or both. The term "cigarette boat" is especially popular because it is a brand name for a line of go-fast boats that popularized and largely defined the class in the 1960s, made by Don Aronow's Cigarette Racing Team. "Cigar boat" is often preferred because it avoids confusion with that brand. Although modern go-fast boats postdate the fleet that was used for rum-running during the Great Depression, some of those boats were small and extremely fast, a theme that is shared with later smuggling (such as drug smuggling); thus, go-fast boats are sometimes informally (jocularly) called rum-runners.
Reader's Guide
Reflecting their racing heritage, accommodations on these five-or-fewer-passenger boats are minimal. A small low cabin under the foredeck is typical, much smaller than a typical motor yacht of similar size. In addition to racing, most buyers buy these boats for their sleek design, power, performance, and mystique. In the 2006 film Miami Vice, go-fast boats are used to smuggle drugs for cartels. In the 1990s TV series Thunder in Paradise, starring Hulk Hogan, two mercenary heroes use a high-tech go-fast boat to fight criminals and villains.
Did You Know?
- A typical go-fast boat can travel at speeds over 80 knots (150 km/h; 92 mph) in calm waters.
- The US Coast Guard uses a rigid-hulled inflatable boat (RHIB) equipped with radar, powerful engines, non-lethal weapons, and an M240 machine gun to intercept go-fast boats.
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