Mooring menace GBR

[Draughty]

Hi all,
A word of warning about recently installed public moorings on the Great Barrier Reef. This may apply to older moorings too.
They have a float which is only just below the surface at low tide and holds the rope down to the mooring off the seabed. From the float up to the buoy is about 4 or 5 metres of floating plaited warp about 80mm diameter (same material as the pennant).
Around low water this warp just lies across the surface, waiting for the current and or wind to change and your boat to drift over it.
I've been tangled at Pancake Creek and Scawfell Island, had to use the engine to get out which is undesirable; gave the ones at Goldsmith Island a miss!
I think the issue is worse the shallower the water.

Rgds

[RaymondR]

I have been using various marine park moorings for years and never had a problem with them but have noticed a number of posts herein lately on the subject. Strange?

[Draughty]

Originally Posted by RaymondR

I have been using various marine park moorings for years and never had a problem with them but have noticed a number of posts herein lately on the subject. Strange?

Hi
I've been using them too without issue except the occasional tapping of the buoy on the topsides.
The ones mentioned are the most recently laid ones; some only in the last few weeks; and I think they are different; I can't recall seeing the floating warp between a sub-surface float and the buoy before.

Rgds

[RaymondR]

I seem to recall some of them having a large floating buoy on the down line and a smaller one on the tail rope with a tag on the eye.

Maybe they just got the down line to short or have gotten cheap with it and are minimizing cordage use.

[Davo1404]

I was in Pancake Creek a month ago. On arrival there was around 10 boats in the inner anchorage. Nobody was using the moorings. A couple of days later a monohull & a catamaran both picked up a mooring. When the tide changed they both became tangled. The monohull rook the combined power of 2 dinghys to push it around. The cataraman had to disconnect its bridle to get free. What a performance.

Originally Posted by Draughty

Hi all,
A word of warning about recently installed public moorings on the Great Barrier Reef. This may apply to older moorings too.
They have a float which is only just below the surface at low tide and holds the rope down to the mooring off the seabed. From the float up to the buoy is about 4 or 5 metres of floating plaited warp about 80mm diameter (same material as the pennant).
Around low water this warp just lies across the surface, waiting for the current and or wind to change and your boat to drift over it.
I've been tangled at Pancake Creek and Scawfell Island, had to use the engine to get out which is undesirable; gave the ones at Goldsmith Island a miss!
I think the issue is worse the shallower the water.

Rgds

[Karanga]

I have used the moorings twice (Heron and Mast Head, which are slightly older) . Now, I avoid them all. I much prefer to use my anchor (in permitted anchoring areas).
As a cat, the wind fighting the current always has the bouy thumping on the aluminium hulls (at 4am, of course!).
Dropping the anchor is also much easier for single-handed operations...