Day Shapes while Anchoring

[ohdrinkboy]

LOL, the LEOs on my lake don't even know what proper lights are for a sailboat under sail at night. Yes, I got stopped. I had to show them online. They would have no clue what a day shape is .

[Chotu]

Originally Posted by Mike OReilly

Which is better; a gun shaped anchor on a cat, or on a mono ?

I’m not quite sure about the answer to this one, but I’m going to host it up in my rigging the next time I’m at anchor or steaming. Ha ha ha.


But seriously, it is kind of weird that this gets such responses. Just above, people are getting impatient. They are getting upset that we don’t use those in this part of the world.

I can’t imagine going into an Anchorage or anywhere and not being able to tell if a boat is moving or not. To be searching carefully for a black ball that is located somewhere on the boat that I have to see in order to figure out if the boat is moving or not. It really bends my brain. Ha ha ha.

Of course if I was in an area that uses them I certainly would. But unfortunately I am stuck in North America for a while.

[boatman61]

Originally Posted by Chotu

I can’t imagine going into an Anchorage or anywhere and not being able to tell if a boat is moving or not. To be searching carefully for a black ball that is located somewhere on the boat that I have to see in order to figure out if the boat is moving or not. It really bends my brain. Ha ha ha.

No searching required if mounted correctly...

[rslifkin]

Originally Posted by boatman61

No searching required if mounted correctly...

Agreed. Mine is visible from pretty much any direction other than directly astern. It's kept tied to an extra boat hook that just gets shoved in between the fender holders and rail when anchored.

[Kelkara]

Originally Posted by Mike OReilly

Here's the thing... those of us who cruise in areas where shapes are not used, have no trouble managing this challenge. There are lots of ways an observant crew can use to tell if a boat is moving.

As I said, the only value I see in the ball is not to tell you if a boat is moving or not, but to tell you that it is not going to start moving.

The only time I have met this situation was sailing among the many anchored freighters in English Bay, one of them had just lowered his ball, pulled up his anchor and was getting underway. A 200m ship accelerates pretty slowly, so from a standing start is very hard to tell that it's moving, but once the anchor is up it *is* moving, and getting faster ... an anchored freighter I treat like an island, but a moving freighter has definite no-go zones ahead of it.


Edit ... I wasn't looking for the ball initially ... but one of the ships sounded its horn (hard to tell which of the many ships), and the lack of anchor ball was a good clue as to which one.

[boatpoker]

See post #9 in this current thread in Trawler Forum.

[Kelkara]

I should add ... I only got into the habit of looking for anchr balls since on a previous occasion in the Gulf Islands it was me that got 5 blasts for being the WAFI trying to sail straight ahead of a freighter that had just got underway ... since half the time the anchor chain is the other side of the ships bow and not visible, I thought to myself "if only there was a way to tell if it is still anchored or not."

[Chotu]

Originally Posted by Kelkara

As I said, the only value I see in the ball is not to tell you if a boat is moving or not, but to tell you that it is not going to start moving.

The only time I have met this situation was sailing among the many anchored freighters in English Bay, one of them had just lowered his ball, pulled up his anchor and was getting underway. A 200m ship accelerates pretty slowly, so from a standing start is very hard to tell that it's moving, but once the anchor is up it *is* moving, and getting faster ... an anchored freighter I treat like an island, but a moving freighter has definite no-go zones ahead of it.


Edit ... I wasn't looking for the ball initially ... but one of the ships sounded its horn (hard to tell which of the many ships), and the lack of anchor ball was a good clue as to which one.

These threads are addictive. My question about this post is this.

Didn’t the absence of an anchor chain going down into the water clue you in that it was underway, even if stationary?

That’s how we tell over here in the non-blackball side of the world. But I guess you probably aren’t really looking for that because you are looking for the black ball over there. We are more looking at how the boat is moving or not. And if it has anchoring tackle down in the water or not.

You know when you are driving a car and you see the wheels turn ever so slightly on the other car so you know exactly what it’s going to do? that’s how we perceive it here where we don’t have the black balls in use. We can just see what the boat is doing. By observation.

I guess there are a lot of things like that that we don’t have over here. If you think about that whole kit that French people are required by law to use when they drive. That neon yellow vest. All of those flares and whatever else they carry. We don’t carry any of that kind of stuff. Just a different culture I guess.

[Phyrcooler]

It’s amusing to read yet another thread on this topic. And as usual, the argument seems to be “They’re stupid, unnecessary, and nobody does it” vs. “it’s the law”, and “possible liabilities”. These apples to oranges arguments get made over and over, when as counterpoints, they’re irrelevant. Few of the “It’s the law/liability” types argue that there is any real safety benefit, nor disagree that they are mostly stupid from a visual standpoint for the majority of small vessels. Conversely, the crowd stating they are “Unnecessary” really have no argument that it ISN’T the law.

Maybe a better use of folks time would be with confronting the rule makers - proposing that day shapes are unnecessary for any vessel less than 60’ and not towing. I don’t know… just a thought.

Back to the argument!

[Kelkara]

Originally Posted by Chotu

These threads are addictive. My question about this post is this.

Didn’t the absence of an anchor chain going down into the water clue you in that it was underway, even if stationary?

Which is more visible ... the chain or the ball?

[Oeanda]

I guess I’m gonna spend the rest of my days looking for those black balls now, which may or may not a good thing.
The photos used in the thread are from very close up, and angled for maximum visibility. I suspect the ball is not going to be visible against a mountain backdrop, which is the normal way of things around here. At least not unless one goes a lot closer than usual with the binoculars, which here would be considered rude, and certainly unnecessary.
But I can see it being helpful in some situations out in the world where it’s more crowded. And at least everyone who’s made it this far in the thread knows what the black ball looks like, if we ever see one. So that’s good.

[Simi 60]

Originally Posted by Lodesman

Didn't you make the argument that you could see the anchor chain - now you're complaining that the ball is tiny. I'd argue that ball is a lot more visible than the chain, and likely would be visible from more angles than the chain.

I can see the boat before I see the ball or chain.

Don't hit the boat - simple.

Do people really steer towards boats that aren't moving
Don't see a ball , run around waving arms shrieking "OMG, there's no ball" and hit it anyway?

[Anders]

Originally Posted by boatman61

No searching required if mounted correctly...

I would definitely have to to search for that tiny ball in the sailing yacht. Long before that I would have realised that she's not moving and have an anchor chain out.


I'm in the Med. Very few boats uses an anchor ball.

[Simi 60]

Originally Posted by Kelkara

Which is more visible ... the chain or the ball?

I couldn't see either
But I could see this massive orange ship

Here's a tip.......don't hit that.

[rslifkin]

Originally Posted by Simi 60

I couldn't see either
But I could see this massive orange ship

Here's a tip.......don't hit that.

Agreed. But as mentioned earlier, if the ship appears stopped, the ball gives 1 piece of info that may be useful in avoiding the ship (whether it's going to remain stopped or may start moving at any time). Of course, anything that big should have class A AIS, so if they've got their status properly set, that will tell you if it's anchored or just stopped.