[aaroninsf]

This has got to be settlement-chasing,

directly akin to the people who throw themselves into stopped cars in Russia for insurance fraud purposes, only to be captured on dash-cam video and derisively immortalized on social media.

The other viable explanation is "but Google Maps told me to drive off the pier."

[bee_rider]

It seems too random to be a scam, the perpetrator needs to find a mushroom book with an error in it to do the scam in the first place.