Ruling: Water Hazard vs. Standing Water

[kfowler]

Ran into an interesting one during a work scramble on Friday. We've had a lot of rain here and there was a lot of casual water around. Bunkers were flooded and such. The last hole has a natural pond running along the right side. One of the teams hit their ball into the fringe of the water.

Now the lake had flooded higher than normal. Where the ball landed, even though it was fully submerged you could see the grass underneath. So during normal conditions, the ball would have been fully playable and not in the water.

The team ended up declaring "casual water" and too relief without a penalty.

I was curious so I asked the starter what he thought the ruling was. He said they normally have stakes out to designate the hazard but had removed them because of the flooding. He said he could see it either way.

I say it's the same as hitting it into a water hazard. Since you cannot tell where the hazard officially starts, you have to assume that if the ball is in any part of the water, it's in the hazard.

It was a friendly golf outing so I let it slide but was curious what the ruling would be.

[sean_miller]

Ran into an interesting one during a work scramble on Friday. We've had a lot of rain here and there was a lot of casual water around. Bunkers were flooded and such. The last hole has a natural pond running along the right side. One of the teams hit their ball into the fringe of the water.

Without stakes, they made a judgement call based on where they thought the hazard ended. There's often enough grassy area outside the water, but still technically within the hazard, that I couldn't say without pictures.

[Fourputt]

First, I have no idea why They would remove stakes just because the water was a bit high, All that does is make any such rule more confusing. However.... The rules of golf cover this eventuality:

25/2 Overflow from Water Hazard Q. If a pond (water hazard) has overflowed, is the overflow casual water? A. Yes. Any overflow of water from a water hazard which is outside the margin of the hazard is casual water.

Of course, this means that you must be able to identify the margin of the hazard.

[J_Bone]

Now the lake had flooded higher than normal. Where the ball landed, even though it was fully submerged you could see the grass underneath. So during normal conditions, the ball would have been fully playable and not in the water.

I would have given him the relief based on what you said.

[The Hacker]

My ball = casual water.

Your ball = hazard.