Container Ship and Saliboats

[captain58sailin]

Nightmare Navigation - Containership Outbound Through Pack of Sailboats - gCaptain

Just a little insight for people to understand what it looks like from the bridge of the ship, maybe shed some light as to the challenges aboard larger vessels when encountering small sailing vessels.

[Cottontop]

Wow.

Enlightening.

[tbodine88]

Plus they are probably not well manned enough to keep a watch on the bow, just in case some one tries sailing in front of that crane.

[Cottontop]

Probably wouldn't matter. I don't suppose those ships stop/turn very quickly.

[Ukeluthier]

I'm well aware that it is the responsibility of us little guys to stay out of the way of large vessels, but -- as an engineer -- it would seem to me in these days of "drive by wire" control systems to be a relatively simple matter to equip new ships with an alternate helm station in the bow specifically for entering and leaving harbors.

The cost would likely be offset by savings on litigation with the idiots who get themselves run down and survive to sue.

[Steadman Uhlich]

Good to see.

It shocked me to see how many boats crossed so close. I can see why a pilot of a large vessel would lay on the horn.

[dannc]

Originally Posted by Steady Hand

Good to see.

It shocked me to see how many boats crossed so close. I can see why a pilot of a large vessel would lay on the horn.

I think I saw three sail boats cross the ship bow from port to starboard and one from starboard to port. Its hard to tell since the sails disappear behind the containers and bow. Even with the time lapse photography "speeding" up the video, those sail boats had nuts at the helm.

No way for that ship to stop even if they saw the boats stopped in their path.

If one of the port side boats had missed a tack, it would have been ugly...

When I was 3-4, I remember being on a power boat in the St. Johns river and seeing two other power boats swerve in front of a barge under tow. The tow and boats were running down river, but the boats came very close to the bow of the barge and there was no way for the tug captain to see those boats at that point. I guess it did not really mater since if the power boats had lost power there was nothing the tug captain could have done. I remember thinking the people on the power boats were stupid.

Later,
Dan

[newhaul]

Kind of scary to watch the video however the pilot of the cargo vessel knew he would be going thru the race area he knew when it would start and when it was expected to end weekly events are listed in the annual ntm and specials are listed in the weekly lnm San Diego is part of district eleven I get them here for district 13. The vessel is required to have at a minimum an electronic copy on board

[boatman61]

Irrelevant.. if sailboat s are crossing a channel used by commercial shipping constrained by draught they are obliged to give way..
Or do you expect them to anchor offshore and wait for the kids to finish playing

[Stu Jackson]

boatman's right. Here on SF Bay the local PICA instituted rules for ALL racing - don't get in the ey of the big guys. Ever.

What is so hard?

I know, I know, ya can't legislate stupid, but once one of those racing skippers got DNF'd the word got out.

[newhaul]

Originally Posted by boatman61

Irrelevant.. if sailboat s are crossing a channel used by commercial shipping constrained by draught they are obliged to give way..
Or do you expect them to anchor offshore and wait for the kids to finish playing

That's not what I meant and you know it as a ticket carrier yourself I meant to point out they were aware of idiots in the area therefore should have and likely did have extra watchstanders on the bow area in radio contact with the bridge to minimise the likely hood of an unfortunate incident. But you are correct. DQ a few of the idiots and I'm sure the situation will improve for real sailors. Trying to make a living.

[woodenboats]

I live on the River Elbe close to Hamburg, Germanys biggest port. Commercial traffic here is hefty, on occasion there is a steady parade of huge vessels up to 360+ m long. Many of my Neighbours are or were commercial captains, so I asked them about the manouverability oft such ships. I've been told that they need up to 2nm to stop and will continue in their course up to 2 Minuten after laying rudder. Basically in the very narrow shipping channels here there is absolutely nothing they can do to avoid a collision with a small boat.
They may not have the right of way, but thay definitely have the "right of weight".

Sent from my Lenovo B8080-H using Cruisers Sailing Forum mobile app

[Cheechako]

While I agree that in places like that small boats need to just stay clear, My feelings are that bridge attendant cannot see well enough based on the cargo location or design.

[K_V_B]

Originally Posted by captain58sailin

Just a little insight for people to understand what it looks like from the bridge of the ship, maybe shed some light as to the challenges aboard larger vessels when encountering small sailing vessels.

I spend a week on a freighter last summer. It was quite enlightening. At full see the skipper would look out for yachts, and if needed change course. But entering a narrow harbour he would stay on his track and rely on the small boats stay out of his way, as they are legally required to.
He would blow his horn, and announce his position on VHF at regular intervals as he was coming around the turns of the river up to Waterford.

Originally Posted by Ukeluthier

I'm well aware that it is the responsibility of us little guys to stay out of the way of large vessels, but -- as an engineer -- it would seem to me in these days of "drive by wire" control systems to be a relatively simple matter to equip new ships with an alternate helm station in the bow specifically for entering and leaving harbors.

The cost would likely be offset by savings on litigation with the idiots who get themselves run down and survive to sue.

The only thing that would bring is that the skipper would know sooner if he ran over a yacht.

[dwedeking2]

We came back into San Diego bay Saturday afternoon when a huge car carrier was headed out. They had a pilot tug out in front of ship keeping an eye on all the boats (it was the end of the day rush hour traffic as everyone came back in to dock).