Fresh off his comeback Bassmaster Elite Series win, Jamie Hartman displayed more heroics when he came to the aid of a couple whose boat burned and sank on Oneida Lake.
“I made a mad dash to a burning boat and rescued this older couple from the water after they bailed from the boat. Everyone is OK just a bit shaken up!”
Hartman posted that along with a video showing black smoke billowing from the boat as a helicopter circled. The man he picked up turns to the camera and is heard saying, “The boat’s name is Devil Or Angel. I guess today was the devil.”
Hartman served as guardian angel.
Originally from New York state, Hartman opted to stick with plans to pre-practice for next month’s northern swing instead of attending ICAST. He was fishing with a couple others when they passed a pontoon boat and heard one of its occupants yell.
“This guy goes, ‘Hey look at that!’ I turned and saw black smoke just pouring out of this boat,” Hartman said. “I saw flames. It was right in the middle of the lake and I had just drove through there, so I knew it must have just happened.
“I know there has to be people on that boat. But I’m not going to go on that boat, because now it’s fully engulfed. They’re probably in the water — I was hoping to God they bailed.”
As he raced over and went around the large pleasure boat, Hartman found the older man and woman floating with life jackets on. He got them in his boat then idled away as the man said the gas tank was full.
“The guy told me there were just driving along and all the sudden, BOOOOF!! It came from underneath the front — the whole floorboards just blew up,” he said. “All the smoke started coming up and he tried to get a fire extinguisher on it. By the time he did, it was already in flames and his wife was yelling at him to get off the boat.”
Hartman didn’t know much more about the couple, except they kept the boat at a marina there. He said he signaled to a fire boat arriving that he had the boat’s occupants, and then two other fire boats joined but never could fully extinguish the flames.
“The boat ended up sinking, and they threw out a big old orange buoy to mark where it went down,” Hartmand said. “The couple was a little shook up but calmed down. The man said thank goodness they have insurance.
“And they kept thanking me. I told them, ‘You don’t owe me nothing. I’m just glad you’re alive.’ They couldn’t thank me enough.”
There were a number of other boats in the area, but Hartman acted quickly enough to be the first there.
“I don’t feel like I did anything out of the ordinary,” he said. “I just did what I was supposed to do, what anybody else would have done.”
The fire boat later came over to Hartman’s boat to take care of the couple, leaving Hartman and crew to stare at each other over the crazy occurrence.
Hartman experienced several crazy days in winning the Academy Sports + Outdoors Bassmaster Elite at Lake Guntersville in late June. Hartman rallied from 10th with a Championship Monday big bag of 23 pounds, 15 ounces, and the weigh-in was the fastest ever as a nasty storm approached, cutting the fanfare for his win.
“I sat there and (the storm) just kept coming and the guys kept rolling through so quickly,” he said. “I put my head down and said, ‘Is this really the way my first time is going to happen?’ I’m going to win and this is how it’s really going to go down? … And I’m freaking fine with it.”
And Hartman won the hard way. He came in saying he had “a crazy, crazy intuition that I was going to win that tournament, even before I started practice. Don’t know where it come from. Don’t have a clue.”
That didn’t look right when he stood in 46th place after Day 1 with 14-13, but 20-10 on Saturday moved him to 17th, yet he was still more than 9 pounds out of the lead.
“I had told my girlfriend I think I’m going to win this event. I have never said that before. Then I end up struggling, then I fought tooth and nail just to get into the top 35,” he said. “And then again when I whacked them on Day 3 (20-4), I’m going to move up and be fine, but I squeaked into the top 10 by 2 ounces.”
On the final morning, Hartman was the star of Bassmaster LIVE, landing lunker after lunker from one spot in a flurry that made up his 7-2 deficit to Matt Arey and gave him the lead. Others in the top 10 made runs throughout the day, but Hartman made an important late cull that allowed him to stave off Arey and hard-charging Chris Zaldain by 6 ounces.
“I had thought my intuition was wrong, but I still wanted to move up, climb the pay scale and I need points. It’s not easy to win one of these,” said Hartman, who was close twice in his rookie season. “I was talking with a friend — ‘What the heck does it take to get into a top 10?’ It’s really, really hard. You have to be on your game all three days. Then I said to win, it’s even just another totally different level.”
Hartman credits switching up after the first day and on the final morning. “The weather came and I made the right choice,” he said.
The win gave Hartman some comfort in the Toyota Bassmaster Angler of the Year standings, pushing him up to 18th as the Elites fish two events next month in upstate New York, where Hartman cut his teeth. The Berkley Bassmaster Elite at St. Lawrence presented by Black Velvet is Aug. 15-18, with the SiteOne Bassmaster Elite at Cayuga Lake is the following weekend, Aug. 22-25.
“I haven’t fished Cayuga in forever. It’s been two years since St. Lawrence. It’s three hours from my house,” he said, noting previous plans to pre-practice trumped ICAST. “I’m always focused on the tournaments. The way I think, and I’ve always been like this, I’ve never taken on sponsors I don’t believe in. I’ll make my living the hard way — I’ll earn it … by catching them, the way I’ve always done.”