Those locks can come jarred loose anytime dirt daubers or not. You can hit a wave hard and it will jar loose.....However if you loosen your depth clamp and slide it all the way down as far as it will go and tighten it will keep deployment from happening. Or you can buy a special Ram Mount that will hold you shaft down and prevent this....or you can tie it down with a bungee cord, or you can get a device from E-Z Poleholder that will prevent this. Sorry this happened to ya....Torch hit a big wave wrong and his deployed and tore his whole terrova off of his boat. Come by my house and I will show you how I have mine fixed to prevent that. Oh yeh........check with your boat insurance folks.