Not very common unless you suffer from dropsy.

I took out a deckie once. He dropped a tld 25 combo.  next drift we caught it.   lucky.

Fairly common i'd say,

Two seasons ago, managed to snag someones line (so i thought). Turned out to be a BRAND NEW boat spinning outfit attached to it with a 10kg pinky attached at the other end. Snapper fell off at surface though due to ruffed up leader.
 

Random much

 Mate took his Father in law out christmas day, year before last, who dropped his christmas present Tiagra 30/T Curve combo over the side not even a day old.

Not a happy son in law. ha ha

Boomer 

 I actually cast an Ambassador combo overboard once while fishing for Skippy. Hands were greased up with berley so off it went into the distance never to be seen again lol.

 Have found a couple combos while spearing, they look nice hanging on the wall with all the barnicles growing on them. 

Been there , done that a few months back near carnac inexpensive whiting combo ...slipped thru hands whilst mate was casting ...more paranoid about more expensive gear bouncing out of rocket launchers but has never happened ....touch wood

 Now I won't feel so much like a gumball when I drop mine........getting older not as coordinated like before:) 

cheers

Mate of mine forgot to set the drag while we were fishing for sharks in Exmouth. He got a run and my Sea Jigger 325 along with his 3 day old Saragosa took off like a rocket.

Ive only ever lost two combo's of a boat. Both were lost out of the rod holder after snagging the bottom , the rig let go of the bottom wich caused the rod to bounce out of the holder.

Since then i refuse to use that type of rod holder again. Here is the ofending holder .

Cheers Grant .

 All most lost my tirgra 50 & tcurve last week wen 1 of the rocket launcher broke off found it on the bimny resting againt the outrigger 

Seen it happen a few times, Once on the land brand new T-curve Calcutta combo handle got knocked on barra took it out . It was caught a few casts later with a diving lure still with fish attached. Crazzzzzy

many years back whilst fishing of the old palm beach jetty i pulled out an old spin combo covered in all sort of growth.two weeks later exactly the same thing happened again i don't know how long it takes for the growth to happen but i guess a couple of months. something took a liking to spin out fits and collected a couple some months prior to my retrieving them

Fishing along side my mate down at South Contos, he jammed the rod butt in to the beach and went to pull a cigarette out of his top pocket. The rod took off, by the time he'd taken a step after it , it had covered 10 metres and by the time he'd taken 4 it was 30 metres away and disappearing in the surf. Kiss good bye to a butterworth 8144 and a 499 mitchell reel, both near new.

Lost my Berkley Drop-Shot just prior to xmas trawling off Point Walter - thought I had placed it back in the rod holder after losing a tailor and mate was hooked-up so I took the wheel. He called out when he saw it it in the water but I also had car keys and phone so I hesitated for a second and it was gone. I was pretty dark for a couple of hours but mates thought it was bloody hilarious. Sounder showed depth of 12.5 metres and no way I was going to get that back, so the upside was a visit to Oceanside to choose a new rod and reel. Hopefully might be able to get down the Donnelly River in a couple of weeks and test it out. Will be making sure first action as I get on a boat is to stow keys, phone and wallet in a waterproof ziplock bag - lessoned learnt.  

 Lost an almost brand new 14000 Spheros and Penn Big game surf off Kwinana Jetty a few years back, cast, bent down to put something in my tackle bag, didnt back off the drag, 30 seconds later a bloke next to me is telling me it hit the water about 20ft out, almost bought me to tears!

Was out off Hillarys during a winter morning and went to lob a live bait skippy on my Demon blood combi jerk and Seagate 3500 and the bail arm flicked over so the weight of the fish ripped the rod from my hands, saw it wasnt sinkin so I jumped in wearing several layers and uggies, takin another rod over with me (hooked on jacket) saved them both, climbed aboard, laughed, dropped the skippy down and within seconds hooked up and landed abouta 15 kg sambo in 10m, cleaned the reels out that arvo

Lost My handline with release weight in 50-60mtrs of water out from two rocks, had just caught a undersize dhufish and was doing the right thing when I was snapping my weight back I let it slip by accident, quick check of the pockets and I jumped in a grabbed it....Thats same day I caught a shark. I also bought my little girl a brand new spin outfit for xmas and was trying to show her how to cast a squid jig.. 3rd cast the whole thing went in never to be seen again....bought her another one the next day because I felt bad for her.

Lost a brand new t-curve and okuma cedros to a shark 3 days after xmas. Rod was two days old and first trip out with reel. Got shark to side of boat,forgot to back off the drag put the rod down to grab pliers and cut leader,shark dove straight down and pivoted the rod over the side of the boat. Didnt have a chance to grab it and it was gone. Dont feel so bad now after reading all the other stories on here. Also my brother in-law,nephew and son all pitched in a bought me a new t-curve cheers guys

hence why I use the rod clips when the rods are in the rod holders,if they are in the rocket launches I yse stainless steel d rings attached to rott proof cord

 Lost my bait runner oc and jig Wrex pe 3-5 when my kayak sunk. Ironically, the rod was actually leashed to the kayak, unlike most of these stories. Please let me know if you snag my 30kg pro2 tandem kayak haha

  was diving with a new rob allen speargun, first dive, got to close to rocks and bumped my head , leaking a bit of red stuff so abandoned the dive. My mate unloaded the gun , in 40 meters down wallpole way, by pulling back the rubber and letting go. The gun did a gracefull arc into the water some 4 meters from the boat and sunk. $600 gone. O well, I am still here, life goes on.

telling me.  Many years ago when he was married for the first time, his father-in-law dies, gets cremated and his 1st wife and him off they go and take father-in-laws ashs out to sea, one of old farts favourite spots just past Rotto.  Anyway about 6 months later old fart is fishing where he dropped the ashes over, quietly sitting there fishing, next minute gets a bite and the rod flies out of his hand and into the ocean, never to be seen again, old fart reckons it was his father-in-law grabbing his rod to go fishing, as he was a good fisherman also hahaha

Hi.

Remove any plastic rod holders in boat and install the Stainless ones. Also  I have a  cord running along both sides of boat with a coupla 6ft cords spliced on to it and Stainless clips on outboard ends.

Either clip onto reel or Wrap above\below reel back onto itself. They long enuff to stand and move around. Plus walk alongside of boat with a decent fish on.

And if you do let go. It'll only get wet.. the best thing I ever put in my fishing boats.

After a fishing sesh straight after night shift and all day on the piss my mate went to put his rod in the rod holder, confident it was in, let go and heard a splash only to look over the side and see his awsome baitcaster setup sinking to the bottom of a muddy creek. Pretty funny for me. Until 2 mates and I were fishing in nearly the same spot a year later and my mates both leaned to one side of my small boat at the same time and flipped my boat. Two of us came up with our rods in hand but the one mate I lent my new Calcutta and Tcurve to came up worrying about the boat. Let my rod go to sink to the bottom...Boat was fine excpet for our wet food. Pretty funny once we swam the boat to shore and bailed it out...except for my Calcutta.