uhmw plastic the mounting plate 14 is preferably constructed from plastic resin metal such as aluminum or similar material although constructing the mounting plate 14 from different types of material is within the scope of the present invention the material must be flexible enough to allow the mounting plate 14 to bend to match the curve of the watercraft hull 16 and to allow compression and bending under pressure however the material of the mounting plate 14 must to be rigid enough so that the inflation of the flotation bladder 28 will not dislodge the flotation bladder 28 from the mounting plate 14 preferably the mounting plate 14 is mounted to the exterior of the watercraft hull 16 or within the recess 20 using either an adhesive for fiberglass and for metal hulls or screws for wood hulls not shown the preferred type of adhesive is a two part epoxy the preferred brand of epoxy is dp 190 or 460 manufactured by minnesota mining and manufacturing 3m st paul minn screws not shown may be necessary on wooden hulled boats since some adhesive only sticks to the outermost layer of paint on the exterior of the hull 16 as illustrated in fig7 13 the flotation device 10 of the present invention further includes a cover 22 a cover removing tubing 24 a directing bladder 26 and a main flotation bladder 28 as illustrated in fig1 the mounting plate 14 has two channels 30 32 spaced apart from each other and extending longitudinally along the length.