Any ideas what this might be?

[Cadence]

Originally Posted by tstano

Solar cover for a hot tub, is that the chlorinator beside it.

As far out as that sounds it could be. Anything floating will act as a fad.

[Montanan]

A SpaceX remote landing pad for recovery of its rockets???

Called "Return to Sender"

[ben2go]

Originally Posted by BillKny

The fascination internet sailors have with "containers" has always baffled me. I have sailed an awful lot of miles, and been along the coast all my life. NEVER have I see a container in the water, or washed up on the beach.

Now there are a lot of things out there, and some of them are scary. And they don't have to be all that big.

Here is something I encountered about 400 miles off the coast of South Carolina, way out past the Gulf Stream. Flat calm day on a delivery, so we were motoring. This was lost in the sun glare, and the first I saw it was about 20 feet of the port beam. Kind of scary. There was about 50 feet of large chain hanging below. WOuld have really sucked to have run over it with the prop running!

On the bright side, we did have a ball catching fish from around it. Jacks and mahi near the surface, and wahoo 50 to 100 feet down.

Attachment 231516

But any ideas what it might be?

We have been led to believe that the ocean is real. That mega size chlorine dispenser is proof that the ocean is just a giant swimming pool. All those waves and sea life is just fictions of our over active imaginations. For further proof see the episode of South Park entitled "Imaginationland".

[Rorzech]

It's just one of those UFO's Unidentified Floating Objects.

[grantmc]

Originally Posted by Rorzech

It's just one of those UFO's Unidentified Floating Objects.

I think Rarzech is on the money, but it's definitely from outer space.

Perhaps the spaceship that the souls of the Heavens Gate people ended up in. So now, 23 years later they're back to start a new cult.

[tdgaffney]

I think Rorzech (and a few others) are on to something. I suspect it is an alien space ship adapted to its mission on earth with a skin of solar arrays. It is probably communicating with the aquatic fauna and finding their ambience indicative of a peaceful earth (or whatever they are calling it). Note the white pod being sent out for recon - standard white flying saucer with conning tower.

[Carl-T705]

I think it looks just link a shipping container, be careful they fall off ships all the time and are very dangerous to cruisers.

[Albinvega27]

[QUOTE=BillKny;3330974]The fascination internet sailors have with "containers" has always baffled me. I have sailed an awful lot of miles, and been along the coast all my life. NEVER have I see a container in the water, or washed up on the beach.

Now there are a lot of things out there, and some of them are scary. And they don't have to be all that big.

I guess there are a lot more stuff that scares internet sailors, as in my knowledge they read a lot while "cruising the oceans on the screen". But only very rarely I read comments about the Gulf of Mexico. Maybe, because what Wes (my sailing mentor) stated when leaving to cross the Gulf of Mexico, was the truth. He said "are you out of your freakin mind? Nobody crosses the Gulf of Mexico on the US side." When approaching New Orleans on the ICW, I decided as per the closed locks on the "mighty" river to head out in Houma. So, I "outet" in Cocodrie and - as instructed - followed precisely the marked waterway. Soon, I saw why! Left and right of the waterway I saw wracks of ships run aground or stacked in old pipes. When heading out open sea I continued to be hard on the watch. No indication whatsoever of old platforms or wrecks of platforms (there are more than 16´000 on US side and no charts). Suddenly, in the back of the boat a wistling sound and I knew, I had past a remanent of platform or pipes. 3 days without any sleep. First time in my life I had arrived in Mexico. Mexico is hell, but the American Gulfside is even more hell.
And yes I have to agree to the treadholder. I never saw a container. Never has a vessel come to close to me (10 miles range) and I never have been hijacked while on the Cocain Route. Yes, a friend of mine has been killed at night while sailing to Panama, out of Nicaragua. But he had a machine gun on board and always bragged, whoever would come close to the boat, he would open fire. If he did with a motorboat passing by in Nicaragua? He probably hit a "drugboat" and when you open fire at them, they´ll kill you. BTW, I have seen during night a lot of them. When they see, you are a sailboat they know, there is no much fuel to get and they continue without wanting to be seen...
The warnings given in internet sailing places are much more scary to me, than the reality. I guess we get all worldwide news compressed and most of us have no real experience to contradict or don´t want the open discussion to refute the said...

[Kaimana]

It's a home-made FAD; we make them all the time here in Hawaii. But this one broke loose from its mooring and that's how the sailor found it drifting.

No one with brains would spend time and money making a drifting FAD, because the next time they went to fish it, it would be gone.

A good FAD costs $5-$10,000, mostly because you need to be able to find it (satellite pinger with GPS, solar panel, and battery is usually installed), and the ones we put in are anchored in 3,000-feet plus of water in strong currents. Lot of guys use old broke jetskis for the float on the FAD, pull out the engines, fill em with pour-in-place foam, and put a huge eyebolt in the bottom to shackle the anchor line to.

This means you need a heavy weight and well-thought-out ground tackle leading up to the float, the actual FAD.

With Warm Aloha, Tim