I remember “Salesman who shows up at somebodys front door and rings their front door bell for 5 whole minutes” use to be a sitcom thing. Doesn’t seem economical to spend so much time at a door where nobody answers though.
Not sure how common this is, but whenever someone commits suicide in a bathtub on TV, they always seem to leave the water running, so that the person who discovers them steps in water outside the room first.
It’s a first resort in most of the British detective shows we watch.
But can’t patch a damaged boat hull.
Edit: Oh. Someone beat me to it.
Although rafts of lashed-together coconut palm trunks and bamboo were clearly shown to not be seaworthy enough, the castaways couldn’t have built an actual dugout canoe?
Here’s a common thing: people attempting to resolve the founding premise problem of the series try something. It fails, not because the idea was faulty but because of some external interference unrelated to the effort. So that effort failed; they never try again.
Not that I ever read a book on how to commit suicide, but the theory is that when you slit you wrists (and if you really mean it, your ankles too), you get in a cool bath with the water running to keep it diluted. This is supposed to prevent clotting and keep blood flowing from the cuts.
No idea if it works in practice.
I also read a book on how to build bombs, but didn’t build one.
They had other issues than staying afloat. If they could not see another landmass from where they were, and had no maps, they had a very good chance of getting utterly lost. They also had no idea what to pack in the way of supplies, but probably a dugout canoe could not hold enough water.
I’m not even sure a dugout canoe could hold enough water for just the Skipper and Gilligan for a trip of unknown length to find anyone they could alert to the presence of the rest; they’d have to leave the Professor and Mary Ann on the island to run things. Everyone else was completely useless-- at least Ginger sometimes put on shows-- they should have eaten the Howells.
I think the suicide thing is a matter of economics. You have a white basin full of clear water. The actor palms a couple of blood packets. He keeps his palms facing away from the camera, then thrusts his hands into the water. Suddenly, bright red clouds spread through the water.
It’s simple but very dramatic. And it’s a lot cheaper than asking the make-up artist to build gruesome-looking prosthenics for the actor’s wrists. Also less likely to get censored.
And yet in “Two Men on a Raft” they tried just that; and before it was destroyed they were going to try it with the inflatable life raft they found (“The Big Gold Strike”). Also from the various “natives visit the island” episodes we know that it was possible to get to and from the island by canoe, at least by seafarers a hell of a lot more competent than the Skipper and Gilligan.
Right, the guess is that they were in one of the lesser uninhabited islands in the Hawaiian chain. Somehow unknown,
The island and the castaways were avoided because it was a leper island.
Well, that and it had Gilligan on it.
Can you imagine the consequences of bringing that bunch back to civilization?
Better to leave them there and just send them an occasional “flotsam” package of goods. Or the Harlem Globetrotters.
Considering that we know that both USA (“Forward March”) and Japanese (“And Then There Were None”) forces were on the island at some time in WW2, that even an outlying island of the Hawaiian chain had been contested would be one of the best kept secrets of the war.
ETA: I mentioned that the Skipper although having years of experience in the Pacific wasn’t necessarily the most competent seaman. Side question: If one had served for three or four years in the Navy during World War Two aboard a large naval vessel (destroyer, cruiser, battleship, carrier) as a rating, how much actual seamanship would one have learned? I can’t imagine naval gunner, engine room mechanic, or mess orderly would necessarily teach one much about navigating or operating a small craft in the open ocean.
If I were stuck on that island and my choices were to try to escape on a cobbled-together boat with The Skipper and Gilligan at the helm, or stay (comfortable in a tropic island nest)…
… I’d say “Screw society, I’m relaxing here!”
(while I figure out a way to make rum and woo Mary Ann)
Apologies but just ran across this. Rod Sterling answered this question in 1961: Deaths-Head Revisited - Wikipedia
Press on
My Dad didn’t serve very long, but I note that he was a Navy Officer (line officer, not a tech specialist) on a carrier and on shore, who never qualified as a Deck Officer – the kind of fundamental “Navy” Officer job involved with a ship on the ocean.
That’s why he’s called “The Professor”!
If anyone on the island knew how to cultivate booze, it was probably “farm girl,” Mary Ann.
My stepfather served two tours in Vietnam, and retired a Captain after putting 30 years in the Navy-- as a pilot. I’m not even sure he could swim.
In “Man With A Net” (season 3) the Professor had managed to ferment and distill some island berries into a potent “tea”.
Depends entirely on what rating the Skipper was, assuming he was enlisted. What you’re looking for is a boatswain’s mate. An officer, of course, would be pretty useless. 
And as to why they never got rescued, that was answered over a decade ago: It was a drug deal gone wrong.