Leopard 46 lost in French Polynesia - stunning rescue pictures

[NoahTreat]

Originally Posted by Overlord

Does anyone know if the cat has been removed from the reef ?

Don't know for sure, but their latest blog has them in New Zealand

https://adventuresofatribe.com/

[Cherod]

For god sake. , what does it matter what " system " one is using , do you run 9 knots 1/2 mile off a corral reef in the middle of the nite. ??? Some folks better just stay home ..

[SecondBase]

Originally Posted by Cherod

For god sake. , what does it matter what " system " one is using , do you run 9 knots 1/2 mile off a corral reef in the middle of the nite. ??? Some folks better just stay home ..

I've done that albeit in a different ocean. My experience was that the ship's GPS plus Navionics on the iPhone gave me enough sea luck to avoid an issue.

As I think back now though I was hugging the coast deliberately to remain separated from commercial ferry routes about a mile off the coral. I was smugly proud of myself at balancing the risk - until I read your post - you're right. I could've added more safety to that situation by backing off the yanmars as well.

[Bleemus]

There is a wonderful anchorage to the northeast of Parea kinda at the top of that image but there is an underwater pipe about halfway that is about five feet below the surface you need to watch for. Approaching that inlet relying solely on Navionics at night is just plain bad seamanship. Sorry it happened.

[JPA Cate]

To Evans:

Thank you so much for running down that Navionics problem!

Ann

[fxykty]

Originally Posted by Bleemus

There is a wonderful anchorage to the northeast of Parea kinda at the top of that image but there is an underwater pipe about halfway that is about five feet below the surface you need to watch for. Approaching that inlet relying solely on Navionics at night is just plain bad seamanship. Sorry it happened.

As far as we can tell from their blog they were headed to Fare, not Parea. Regardless of the chart display, cutting the corner of a fringing reef is silly and for the reason of avoiding rough seas doesn't make sense - seas build up close to a reef, especially when it's turning a corner.

[double u]

Originally Posted by Cherod

For god sake. , what does it matter what " system " one is using , do you run 9 knots 1/2 mile off a corral reef in the middle of the nite. ??? Some folks better just stay home ..

(& the very worst bit is that they seem to persist in blaming somebody/-thing else...)

[danielamartindm]

Originally Posted by estarzinger

Yes, I agree with all three points.

I have never seen an error like this before. It is not missing data, and it is not old/obsolete survey data, and it is not a data layer issue (the three typical errors). I don't really understand how the sounding got warped that way.

The stick markers are an obvious signal of something wrong, as is the simple lack of a fringing reef (which is a characteristic of these islands). However I'm not sure if those would have rung alert bells or not, if I was not specifically looking for errors.

This is an interesting mental test for people's nav and watch keeping practices . . . . Honestly envision yourself planning and executing this rounding . . . Thinking that chart was accurate . . . . How many of us would have managed to avoid the bad outcome? It could have been avoided in several ways, most obviously with more distance, a second charting source, and recognizing the depth sounding were not consistent with the chart (and I suspect the breakers on the reef would have shown up on radar) . . . . But how many people would honestly would have after a long day sailing? We actually always went around the north end of the island because the reef profile was 'safer' (this was back in the captain cook survey paper chart days) and it had better sailing angles.

In the past navionics have been pretty responsive making correction when very specific errors were detailed to them. But they have just "thanked me for my input", rather than actually acknowledged the error and correction, I suspect for legal reasons.

I'm a bit muddled why there should be any differences in Navionics main file displays and derivative iPad-type file displays. Wouldn't uniform displays better enhance safety? And one has to wonder if the east-west skewing we see on the iPad file might be indicative of some broader issue that just happened to show itself here because of the extremity of the topography. Thank you for all the work you've done on this.

[double u]

mulling Navionics over is imho barking up the wrong tree:
with his/their attitude disaster was inevitable & just a question of place & time.
we are all prone to errors of varying severity, all of us have had some lucke escapes (if we cruised long enough) - their "piloting & navigation" falls into another category altogether & the conception of "error" doesn't come into it (but, as I wrote before: what do I know???)

[Bleemus]

Having sailed across the South Pacific three times I feel I can comment. Knowing the chart inaccuracies that abound in that part of the world if someone said to me "we are going to Huahine and enter the lagoon at night relying only on a chartplotter" my reply would have been "your nuts". End of story.

[double u]

if they would have missed the southern tip of Huahine-reef they sure would have hit entering Fare (cause sure as hell they intended to enter there at night).
knowing what punishment the ocean can metre out for small mistakes I think they should realize that they got off lightly, considering their "piloting&navigation"...

[Prairie Chicken]

Originally Posted by bill352

Just to be fair to pilots (and their instructors), that teaching is meant to apply when you can't see out the window. This is meant to keep you from killing yourself as a result of erroneous sensory inputs the primitive brain generates when it doesn't have a horizon. In good weather, it's heads-up all the time.

Yes, you're correct in that training is intended to prevent pilots from trusting their own sensory information. In the 737s the helmsman apparently flies, the pilot flying would be on the dials most of the time until a couple of hundred feet above ground when he would look up to land. A second pilot, not flying, would be watching outside in visual flight conditions... which would have been a prudent thing for this crew to have been doing too by the sounds of it.

[SecondBase]

Originally Posted by Prairie Chicken

A second pilot, not flying, would be watching outside in visual flight conditions... which would have been a prudent thing for this crew to have been doing too by the sounds of it.

Not quite the OP's scenario but let's say you have 4 onboard total and you are running multi-day continuous ops.

Would having two people on-watch within 20 miles of shore be a good balance do would you keep two on watch 24x7 even when you have plenty of perceived sea room?

[NoahTreat]

Originally Posted by danielamartindm

I'm a bit muddled why there should be any differences in Navionics main file displays and derivative iPad-type file displays. Wouldn't uniform displays better enhance safety? And one has to wonder if the east-west skewing we see on the iPad file might be indicative of some broader issue that just happened to show itself here because of the extremity of the topography. Thank you for all the work you've done on this.

With Navionics, you can customize your own display.

[SecondBase]

Originally Posted by NoahTreat

With Navionics, you can customize your own display.

Additionally there is the issue of rendering.

An example is a app might work for iPhone but not work (or not look) exactly the same in Android.

The display code is different so you often
see a slightly different view between devices. What might be an annoyance with a consumer app has a bigger potential impact for a mis-rendered nav image. Not saying that happened here - just another source of errors. Yet another reason to never trust a single GPS manufacturer or chart datum provider.

Maybe too cautious but I always, because of a couple close calls, run 2 different GPS hardware devices each with different underlying chart datum.

The most frequent time this helps? One GPS is egregiously wrong so I look to the other for a "second opinion" on my location. Also if a battery dies on one GPS you keep right on going with the #2 unit.

IMO for a boater redundant GPS units should be one of be top items on the backup equipment list but use it every day

Despite the subtleties GPS chartplotters lower the crew workload and reduce errors in almost every case. I'm a huge fan and I completely trust two chartplotters telling me the same thing.