I think some of you people need to study up on forensic accident reconstruction. It IS a science.
If a police officer stands on a highway, looks at the skid marks and looks at the damage to the vehicles he may come up with a speed ESTIMATE.
If a trained forensic accident reconstruction expert measures the length of the skid marks, weighs the cars, measures the coefficient of friction of the pavement etc. Then plugs these measurements into a formula, then the results are CALCULATED.
I'm sure boats create there own problems, there are no skid marks on the water. However the energy of the impact can still be calculated by the depth of damage, heat cracking etc.
The energy of impact along with the weight of the boats results in the speed of the vehicles. As in all science and engineering the is an expected percentage of error.
When measurements are plugged into a formula the answer is a calculation, not an estimate.
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