Cruisers Forum
 


Reply
  This discussion is proudly sponsored by:
Please support our sponsors and let them know you heard about their products on Cruisers Forums. Advertise Here
 
Thread Tools Search this Thread Rate Thread Display Modes
Old 15-12-2010, 20:17   #151
Nearly an old salt
 
goboatingnow's Avatar

Join Date: Jun 2009
Location: Lefkas Marina ,Greece
Boat: Bavaria 36
Posts: 22,801
Images: 3
Lodesman I currently have 6 books on the colregs including one of the best in my opinion " a seamans guide to the rule of the road" a book that states it is officially approved for use in the royal navy. I suggest you read it And fill in some areas you're weak on.

Nowhere in the rules ( And interpretations are merely just that) does it state that I have to give the " give way" vessel time to take action. In fact the rules state the exact opposite. Once risk of collision has been identified. The give way vessel is expected " to take early and substantial action to keep WELL clear".

As to applying 17(ii) various nuanced interpretations have been put forward usually biased from the type of craft being considered.

For example in a sailboat as the stand on vessel I should hear very quickly the sound signals that that the ship should make to indicate that's it changing course since i when sailing generally am the stand on ( if it intends to do so) yet that almost never happens. Secondly the give way ship should make a clear identifiable course change if doing so. Yet it fact that rarely happens either most make very minor changes that are often hard the determine. All of these factors lead me to invoke 17.ii and I urge others small sailboats to do the same. My original comments were do not stand on into danger ( ie do not get closer then you are comfortable before acting ) commony known as the rule of gross tonnage

Dave
__________________
Interested in smart boat technology, networking and all things tech
goboatingnow is offline   Reply With Quote
Old 15-12-2010, 20:52   #152
CF Adviser
 
Bash's Avatar

Join Date: Dec 2008
Location: sausalito
Boat: 14 meter sloop
Posts: 7,260
Quote:
Originally Posted by Lodesman View Post
But this claim was vowel with my experience

There is no stand-on vessel in restricted vis.
You seem confused. "Consonant" is not only a noun, but also has an adjectival form. Used in this manner, it means "in keeping." In other words, when I said that your claim was not consonant with my experience, I meant that it was not in keeping with my experience.

Additionally, your assertion that there is "no stand-on vessel in restricted vis" is without foundation.

Let me know if you need a translation for "without foundation."
__________________
cruising is entirely about showing up--in boat shoes.
Bash is offline   Reply With Quote
Old 15-12-2010, 21:11   #153
Registered User

Join Date: Jan 2010
Location: Port Ludlow Wa
Boat: Makela,Ingrid38,Idora
Posts: 2,050
Smile Thankyou

Quote:
Originally Posted by ahnutts! View Post
The difference in speed between a sailboat and larger vessels makes course corrections on the part of the sailboat ineffective unless made VERY early. Reminds me of a turtle crossing a freeway with a semi truck bearing down on him. I try to cross shipping lanes at a 90 degree angle when the coast is clear. Ferry routes and shipping lanes are on the chart. If you don't have a good reason to linger then don't.
This is correct.
I used to pull a Be1900 up under the tail of a 747 to stay out of the blast on the ground. Works great till he makes the turn onto the runway. Might does make right. Up here we deal with 20 knot container ships and boomers. The boomers are more trouble. They are not moving at their best speed but are worthy of standing well off. They have earned it. A few tacks more? So be it.

I went down to see my girl today, and winter has not made a dent yet. Hope you all have done the same.

Todd
IdoraKeeper is offline   Reply With Quote
Old 15-12-2010, 22:02   #154
Registered User
 
bewitched's Avatar

Join Date: Sep 2009
Location: SE Asia
Boat: Swan 56
Posts: 891
Images: 3
Quote:
Originally Posted by Lodesman View Post
There seems to be some confusion over rule 17(a).
I agree. And I think it's a great strength of this forum that we have an opportunity to resolve (or at least discuss) the confusion, so please take this post as a genuine attempt to work through an issue that effects all our safety. I'm not arrogant enough to say I'm right, but what I say is what I actually believe. If I'm wrong I need to know.

Quote:
Originally Posted by Lodesman View Post
There are two distinct periods here
I agree. Namely:
Period 1 - When I determine there is a risk of collision and I determine that I am the stand on vessel. At this point I am required to adhere to Rule 17(a)(i) and stand on.

Period 2 - in the words of 17(a)(ii): "as soon as it becomes apparent to her that the vessel required to keep out of the way is not taking appropriate action in compliance with these Rules". At this point the stand on vessel may (but not not must) take action to avoid collision by ... manoeuvre alone

The point where 17(a)(ii) comes into play is where I believe the confusion lies.


Quote:
Originally Posted by Lodesman View Post
the second, when the give-way vessel has been given sufficient and reasonable opportunity to take action, but apparently has not, then the stand-on vessel may take action to avoid. this is not a license for the stand-on vessel to forego its 17(a)(i) responsibility to maintain course and speed simply based on a whim, or for the sake of convenience - where practicable, any alteration should be made only after attempting to ascertain the other vessel's intentions over VHF and/or sounding 5 short blasts.
You seem to believe that this only comes into play once the give way vessel has herself determined that there is a risk of collision, has been given time and opportunity to react, but has chosen not to and that the stand on vessel has attempted to ascertain the give way vessels intentions

My undertanding of 17(a)(ii) is that:
- it does not require that the other vessel has determined that a risk of collision exists. (she may not have seen me, or may have seen me but has determined that no risk exists, pehaps because she has more sophisticated navigation tools at her disposal). Even if she had determined a risk of collision, how would i know?

- The time and opportunity given to react is from my perspective. How would I know how long she has had to react? I am not even aware if she believes a risk of collision exists.

- Rule 17(a)(ii) does not contain any requirement to acertain the intentions of the other vessel

Rule 17(a)(ii) is written from the perspective of what is apparent to the stand on vessel ("as soon as it becomes apparent to her"). Not what is mutually understood by both parties (which may be different)



Quote:
Originally Posted by Lodesman View Post
Realistically, you should never allow a situation to develop to the final stage, where 17(b) requires the stand-on vessel to take whatever action necessary to avoid collision.
With you 100%
bewitched is offline   Reply With Quote
Old 16-12-2010, 04:34   #155
Senior Cruiser
 
GordMay's Avatar

Cruisers Forum Supporter

Join Date: Mar 2003
Location: Thunder Bay, Ontario - 48-29N x 89-20W
Boat: (Cruiser Living On Dirt)
Posts: 49,139
Images: 241
So, does John W. Trimmer, satisfactorily answer the question, and live up to his books title?
__________________
Gord May
"If you didn't have the time or money to do it right in the first place, when will you get the time/$ to fix it?"



GordMay is offline   Reply With Quote
Old 16-12-2010, 04:57   #156
Registered User
 
Vasco's Avatar

Join Date: Apr 2004
Location: Toronto
Boat: CS36Merlin, "La Belle Aurore"
Posts: 7,557
My copy hasn't arrived yet. But the reviews were interesting.
__________________
Rick I
Toronto in summer, Bahamas in winter.
Vasco is offline   Reply With Quote
Old 16-12-2010, 05:30   #157
Registered User

Join Date: Sep 2010
Location: FL
Boat: Jeanneau 419
Posts: 452
I no longer race, but when I did over the previous 30 years on LIS we always have a few ships cross the race course.

If you want to learn how to maneuver around them try racing (during the day) we tack away at about 100-150', or as one of my crew used to say when we can see the paint brush strokes on the hull.

These ships would go thru a fleet of 100 racing boats at times day and night, they must have looked their radar at night thinking it was a Christmas tree.

There was never a problem that I ever heard.

But the most unerving thing I remember was in fog, light air, hearing the wake and motor drone thinking we were clear saw another bow wave from the tow on a cable coming right at us.

That incidence alone is reason enough to add AIS this coming season, for <$200 how can one not have it.


On a side note how accurate is the marinetraffic.com/ais web site?
Jimbo2010 is offline   Reply With Quote
Old 16-12-2010, 07:20   #158
Moderator Emeritus
 
capngeo's Avatar

Cruisers Forum Supporter

Join Date: Jul 2010
Location: Key West & Sarasota
Boat: Cal 28 "Happy Days"
Posts: 4,210
Images: 12
Send a message via Yahoo to capngeo Send a message via Skype™ to capngeo
Quote:
Originally Posted by boatman61 View Post
"Get outa the Bludi way...!!'
My, My, this thread has blathered on for a LONG time, when it can be summed up by this quote from the first page!
__________________
Any fool with a big enough checkbook can BUY a boat; it takes a SPECIAL type of fool to build his own! -Capngeo
capngeo is offline   Reply With Quote
Old 16-12-2010, 07:40   #159
Senior Cruiser
 
boatman61's Avatar

Community Sponsor
Cruisers Forum Supporter

Join Date: Jan 2010
Location: PORTUGAL
Posts: 30,584
Images: 2
pirate

There's been a lot of talk about sound signals on here lately... in my experience this only happens in Ports or once inside the 'Fairway'
I've never had a Big Ship sound its horn before a manouver in the UK Channel TSS when crossing to France... or the Biscay, Med, Atlantic, Carib.... if I'm not sure a Ship/boats seen me or its intentions I get on the VHF and it goes something like this
"East bound motor vessel this is the Sth bound sailing vessel **** fine on your port bow distance 3 miles approx, position ^#^... is it your intention to pass my bow or stern.. I will alter course if required"
80% of the time I get a response "Thank you captain... hold your course we will pass your stern..." or something similar..
The other 15% I get no response other than a change of outline of the approaching ship.... which is good enough for me...
5% of the time no response, no change of heading... so I take it on myself to...
GET OUTA DA BLUDI WAY
__________________

It was a dark and stormy night and the captain of the ship said.. "Hey Jim, spin us a yarn." and the yarn began like this.. "It was a dark and stormy night.."
boatman61 is online now   Reply With Quote
Old 16-12-2010, 08:13   #160
Registered User
 
Tia Bu's Avatar

Join Date: Jul 2009
Location: South Carolina
Boat: 40' Jeanneau
Posts: 492
Last July 4th weekend. Middle of night. 8-10 miles offshore Savannah, Georgia. Half a dozen or more ships were anchored, waiting for the holiday weekend to end before they steamed in to port to unload. Exactly at midnight, pilot boats start running out to the ships. One by one, the ships turn off their anchor lights, turn on the nav lights, and start barreling into the entrance channel.

I'm in a 30' sailboat under sail. We will pass by the outer channel buoy perpendicular to the channel. I keep calling "securite" on the VHF to explain my intended course. Nobody answers. I had talked to someone on the VHF the day before, so I know it works.

As I approach the channel buoy, a pilot boat pulls up to a ship about a mile away. The nav lights go on, the pilot announces a "securite" that he's headed for the channel, and the ship takes off. Right toward me!

I grab a handheld VHF and call frantically. The pilot responds. "Where are you?" I tell him I'll shine a spotlight in my sails. "O.k., I see your white light," he says. "Now I see you on radar." "Can you turn to pass port-to-port?"

I turn about 110 degrees to comply, even though I have the right of way and he is in the open ocean and not constrained by draft. We pass safely, and I resume course. I later figured out a corroded coax coupling at the base of the mast had limited the range of my main VHF radio.

My lesson learned: "Stay out of the bludi way!" They often can neither see you nor hear you.
Tia Bu is offline   Reply With Quote
Old 16-12-2010, 08:28   #161
Moderator Emeritus
 
David M's Avatar

Cruisers Forum Supporter

Join Date: Sep 2007
Location: Eastern Tennessee
Boat: Research vessel for a university, retired now.
Posts: 10,406
I spent 4 years learning the COLREGS at Cal Maritime Academy. We pretty much had them memorized by the time we graduated. We studied case histories of numerous collisions. We studied court outcomes and why they were ruled the way they were. We studied the interpretation of the meanings, not just a literal reading of the Rules. It quite literally took hundreds and hundreds of hours to learn them thoroughly.

Rebel Heart has made a number of excellent points. It is only when one starts studying the COLREGS formally that it all starts making sense. You really do need to spend more than a few hour reading the rule book itself to truly understand the Rules. It is then that it all starts making perfect sense as to why they are written the way they are. Understanding them thoroughly creates a great appreciation for all the thought that was put into the Rules.

Before one seriously starts learning the meanings of the Rules, they are seeming filled with contradictions, undefined terms and gray areas. Trust me, the terms are very defined and there is NEVER a situation that is not covered by the Rules.

No offense, but a number of the posts regarding the Rules are flat out wrong...and following these ideas could turn out deadly or being ruled 100% wrong or mostly wrong in court. Yes, percentage wrong can be assigned in court.

Probably the best thing one could do who does not make their living at sea is to buy a book on the meaning of the Rules. Reading the Rules themselves helps, but it does not explain at all the intentions or the meanings of the Rules. In fact, you cannot fully learn the COLREGS by reading the COLREGS alone. I found books that explain the Rules to be far more educational and entertaining than reading the COLREGS directly, although of course one must do that as well.

Going back to the original post of this thread, of avoiding collision, so far I have seen no mention of AIS. Or perhaps I missed someones mention?

If you have the money, get an AIS transceiver on your boat. It's really hard for a watch officer to miss a vector on his screen. When looking at their electronic chart, this is what catches their eye first. It takes a while for ARPA to create a vector from a contact, if it does so at all. So much of avoiding a collision comes down to making a passing plan as far in advance as is possible and then sticking to that plan. An AIS vector will show long before a steady contact will show on screen. It's not a perfect solution for all situations, nothing is, but it is better than having nothing. An AIS receiver is good, but as someone mentioned earlier, a sailboat is not much more than a turtle crossing a highway with trucks going 70 MPH. At least get yourself lit up on that truckers screen so that he has plenty of time to swerve to avoid you.
__________________
David

Life begins where land ends.
David M is offline   Reply With Quote
Old 16-12-2010, 09:00   #162
Registered User

Join Date: Nov 2010
Location: Lafayette, Louisiana
Boat: Ketch, Hardin 45
Posts: 440
Images: 6
Back to the radars: While delivering an OSV to Ecuador via the Panama Canal. We were passing through the Yuatan straits tween Cuba and the Yuatan peninsula of Mexico, we met a North bound sail boat of about 45 ft range. He was a Fiberglass hull with the round alumium mast. The seas were about 15~17 ft at the time. We have X band radars on our vessel and I never did see him on the screen at any time.
I had him visually only. He had a Davis Radar Reflector hoisted, but apparently it wasn't doing what it was suppose to be doing, reflecting Radar signals back to the other vessel's radar.
So I have notice that they were well hidden in the sea return. And this wasn't the first time I have not seen a vessel on the radars when the seas are running. When leaving Lisbon on a cable layer, I spotted a Japanise fishing boat in the Atlantic... We had to jog around him, the seas were 15 to 18 ft at the time. He never did show on the radar then either. Both of these were before the days of AIS.
AIS is fast becoming a major safety item to have on your vessel, especially if you are a tad smaller then the big boys that are moving around out there.
Radar is a nice tool for the Bridge watch. But the eyes of the watch officer and the lookouts are most important in pertaining to the safety of your ship.
boasun is offline   Reply With Quote
Old 16-12-2010, 09:04   #163
Moderator Emeritus
 
David M's Avatar

Cruisers Forum Supporter

Join Date: Sep 2007
Location: Eastern Tennessee
Boat: Research vessel for a university, retired now.
Posts: 10,406
Agreed, an AIS transceiver can cover for some of radars shortcomings, although neither are perfect nor is one a replacement for the other.
__________________
David

Life begins where land ends.
David M is offline   Reply With Quote
Old 16-12-2010, 09:13   #164
Registered User

Join Date: Feb 2008
Boat: 2017 Leopard 40
Posts: 2,662
Images: 1
Quote:
Originally Posted by Jimbo2010 View Post
snip

On a side note how accurate is the marinetraffic.com/ais web site?
It's accurate for what it shows, but it is not complete by any means. There are huge gaps between shore stations. In Western long Island Sound the reporting land stations don't show class b vessels at marinetraffic.com -- so some filtering is going on somewhere (in this case the shore stations?) Also -- class B vessels only have a range of about 10-15 miles (class A perhaps 10 miles more depending on antenna height) and shore stations are often spaced wider than that so there are gaps of coverage and that's why I wouldn't rely on it for navigation.

If you have your own onboard AIS receiver (or transceiver) you are assured of getting the local traffic you need.
SailFastTri is offline   Reply With Quote
Old 16-12-2010, 09:42   #165
Moderator Emeritus
 
David M's Avatar

Cruisers Forum Supporter

Join Date: Sep 2007
Location: Eastern Tennessee
Boat: Research vessel for a university, retired now.
Posts: 10,406
The delay is too great for it to be used onboard. With an onboard AIS receiver, the delay is a few seconds at most. The greatest delay I have seen is half a ship length...as seen through a radar position on an electronic compared to the AIS position on the same screen.

Would anyone use a radar in close quarters whose information was 10 minutes old?

Through the internet the time difference can be quite a few minutes. While onboard the other day in Grizzly Bay, I was looking at my boat on marinetraffic.com on someones iPad. The delay was about 10 minutes. That is far too great of a difference in time to make good collision avoidance decisions.

Additionally what the internet AIS sites do not provide you with is a Relative Motion Line (RML) of the other vessel, a Closest Point of Approach (CPA) distance and a Time to CPA line TCPA. This information is critical for making a plan to avoid a collision.

For example, you might see that ship in the fog with your iPad, but you might not see its course change to avoid you for another 10 minutes. So you tack now to avoid its track, while in the meantime you have tacked towards the ship where your track line now intersects the ships track line with a 50 meter CPA...not good. You don't want to do the Avoidance Dance, where the other vessel mirrors your actions. Additionally the rules are written to avoid the Avoidance Dance.

Get a real AIS receiver at the very least, besides it being pretty much real time, it's a far more reliable data connection than WiFi or cellular.
__________________
David

Life begins where land ends.
David M is offline   Reply With Quote
Reply

Thread Tools Search this Thread
Search this Thread:

Advanced Search
Display Modes Rate This Thread
Rate This Thread:

Posting Rules
You may not post new threads
You may not post replies
You may not post attachments
You may not edit your posts

BB code is On
Smilies are On
[IMG] code is On
HTML code is Off
Trackbacks are Off
Pingbacks are Off
Refbacks are Off


Similar Threads
Thread Thread Starter Forum Replies Last Post
24vdc Help for HUGE Anchor Windlass cat man do Electrical: Batteries, Generators & Solar 52 01-01-2011 16:30
Huge Cat Bloodhound Multihull Sailboats 1 09-02-2010 13:14
Huge storm hit PNW-pict/video delmarrey Flotsam & Sailing Miscellany 1 25-08-2008 19:15
Searching for informatin about big sail ships.Famous pirates ships. Santa Maria venelin General Sailing Forum 0 23-02-2008 02:20
is there a huge difference in price between... fujiwara takumi General Sailing Forum 10 26-08-2004 02:18

Advertise Here


All times are GMT -7. The time now is 11:15.


Google+
Powered by vBulletin® Version 3.8.8 Beta 1
Copyright ©2000 - 2024, vBulletin Solutions, Inc.
Social Knowledge Networks
Powered by vBulletin® Version 3.8.8 Beta 1
Copyright ©2000 - 2024, vBulletin Solutions, Inc.

ShowCase vBulletin Plugins by Drive Thru Online, Inc.