Atalanta of Chester/Hanne Knutsen trial

[l'escargot]

I'm in Scotland at the moment and it was a front page story in the Daily Record and the Scottish Sun when the trial started.

And the Mail and the Telegraph and the BBC and the Guardian and PBO and YBW and Capital Radio...

The outcome of this could impact on anyone who sails in the Solent and possibly even further afield.

 

[lpdsn]

Wasn't Atalanta already on the tanker's starboard side? So...if the guard-boat had told them to stand clear, they'd only have had to steer hard over, one way or t'other, to remain on her starboard side. It might've lost them a position in the race, but it would've saved them a very close encounter too. Why do you say they would've had to "nip across its bow" in order to reach the starboard side?

Remaining on the starboard side of the tanker and being able to bear off to their next mark would've allowed them to continue their race with the least disadvantage, so it is wrong to say their actions and the resultant very close encounter were because they were worried about losing position in the race. If they'd successfully passed down the port side of the tanker, as they were clearly aiming to do in the final stages, they'd have lost out by considerably more.

Whatever else is unclear or inexplicible, the action in continuing to head south was nothing to do with the race.

 

[lpdsn]

It occurs to me after reading all this speculative "analysis" that both skippers have had loads of time to decide the "facts" as they see them & that there are likely to be at least 2 different versions of events - possibly more if witness accounts are added into the mix. The phrase "Choose your lies carefully" springs to mind.

It might be hard to get a conviction for anything out of a mess like that. Just more public money wasted with precious little hope of any benefit for anyone but the media perhaps.

You mean that doesn't happen in other court cases, criminal or otherwise?

 

[l'escargot]

...Whatever else is unclear or inexplicible, the action in continuing to head south was nothing to do with the race.

The fact that he was racing is a red herring, he could have just as easily been on a passage on that course and had to make the same decisions and course alterations. Everything he did was to the detriment of his position in the race.

 

[Pete R]

Apart from local news, the media have completely ignored it. Only benefit seems to be to the armchair Admirals.

DM, Guardian, BBC News, Telegraph to name a few have covered it.

Edit.....And it looks like Merry Girl has already covered what I have said.....

 

[oldvarnish]

And the Mail and the Telegraph and the BBC and the Guardian and PBO and YBW and Capital Radio...

OK, sorry. Must have passed me by. Could it be, though, that they got excited on the opening day but interest and coverage has waned somewhat since?

My guess is that the press were only interested in this in the first place because there was a cracking set of pictures to go with it.

 

[l'escargot]

OK, sorry. Must have passed me by. Could it be, though, that they got excited on the opening day but interest and coverage has waned somewhat since?

My guess is that the press were only interested in this in the first place because there was a cracking set of pictures to go with it.

Not only pictures but it gave them the opportunity to portray a rich yachtie, who was also a naval officer, on his luxury yacht, behaving in a stupid way, in the upper class playground that is Cowes week - a handful of stereotypes in one headline. A sub editors dream...

 

[oldvarnish]

Not only pictures but it gave them the opportunity to portray a rich yachtie, who was also a naval officer, on his luxury yacht, behaving in a stupid way, in the upper class playground that is Cowes week - a handful of stereotypes in one headline. A sub editors dream...

Agreed. On a thin news day it would be a dream come true.

 

[toad_oftoadhall]

Taking the liberty of playing around with VicS diagram I see it something like this

What he would hope to do:

What he tried to do:

The courses are just representative rather than reflecting accurate positions.

Yup, that's the conclusion I think the scant evidence leads us to, and I'm sure the main body of my fellow Armchair Admirals[1] see the situation broadly that way.

[1] Well I don't see myself as an Armchair Admiral. More an Armchair Cockney-able-seaman-on-the-Bridge-who-says-"Cup-of-Cocao,-Sir?"-to-Jack-Hawkins.

 

[Seatrout]

IANAL, and may be entirely wrong here, but isn't it the situation that the infringement of the IRPCS is criminal law, and the bye-laws are civil law?

You are. Bye-laws are criminal law. Civil law deals with disputes e.g. contracts, injury claims, divorce, paternity etc.
The burden of proof is 'beyond a reasonable doubt' and what this means, is an entire debate which has the potential to reach and exceed, the many submissions as this thread.

 

[oldvarnish]

[1] Well I don't see myself as an Armchair Admiral. More an Armchair Cockney-able-seaman-on-the-Bridge-who-says-"Cup-of-Cocao,-Sir?"-to-Jack-Hawkins.

Good for you, sir!! Too many Admirals and not enough Able-Seamen - that's the trouble with the world today.

 

[VicS]

Reading back that is a typo so I can see why you're confused It should read before they passed starboard to starboard. But before their bows passed in order to pass starboard to starboard, both swung to starboard. What I was trying to highlight was that I t wasn't a simple crossing situation with the yacht going across the tanker on a straight course - with the tanker making it's turn to starboard, if the yacht had carried on it's course it would have still crossed the bows of the tanker and risked being run down. Possibly ending up on the starboard anchor instead...

Taking the liberty of playing around with VicS diagram I see it something like this
.
.
.
.

The courses are just representative rather than reflecting accurate positions.

Yes I'd agree something like that except that I think Atalanta may have been sailing somewhat south of the pink line. Closer perhaps to the dotted pink in the pic below.

The collision certainly occurred, as has been pointed out, early in the turn when in line with the buildings at Calshot Activities Centre. Somewhere in or near the red circle is my best estimate:

 

[l'escargot]

Yes I'd agree something like that except that I think Atalanta may have been sailing somewhat south of the pink line. Closer perhaps to the dotted pink in the pic below.

The collision certainly occurred, as has been pointed out, early in the turn when in line with the buildings at Calshot Activities Centre. Somewhere in or near the red circle is my best estimate:

Yes I would agree, hence my rider about the courses being representative rather than reflecting accurate positions. I have been unable to find an actual GPS position for the collision but I would be interested to actually place it on the chart.

 

[Alan ashore]

Yes I would agree, hence my rider about the courses being representative rather than reflecting accurate positions. I have been unable to find an actual GPS position for the collision but I would be interested to actually place it on the chart.

I think it's possible if anyone has the time or inclination, to place the collision with considerable accuracy from the video evidence plus AIS track, by elaborating post #321, (using charts, Google earth etc to plot the transits precisely). The only thing that would scupper this is if the camera was up the hill somewhere, not as seems most likely, on the Esplanade. I'd also make an assumption that the AIS position represents the bridge of the Tanker, in the absence of any other info.

 

[Uricanejack]

I'm in two minds about the comprehensibility of the end game.

If the earlier conjecture (and be aware that I see ALL of what we are doing here as speculation, in which we are indulging largely because we find it interesting to do so) that the yacht's turn from East ish to South ish was as a result of misapprehending the ships future movements, then that bit is IMHO explicable. I suspect that such mistakes are frequently made (e.g. by the many novices who may be about at times), even for ships that have not been obliged to change their immediate plans after signalling Echo. My guess is that the Defendant, by no means a novice, would have been unlikely to make that mistake in normal circumstances. It has been reported that the defense will cite confusing sound signals, and I'm inclined to believe they could indeed be part of the explanation for the turn to the South.

But thereafter, I don't know enough about the precise times, distances, speeds and crucially rate of turn to form an opinion on the explicability of the collision itself.

I have been messing about in boats of one type or another since about the age when I learned to ride a bike. 45 or so years.

I started of making mistakes, I'm still making them today. No doubt I will still be making mistakes tommorow. The frequency is hopefully less as I gradualy gain expierience.
The quality of my seamanship, boat handling, watchkeeping, collision avoidance is inversly proprtional to the quality of old salty sea story Im telling at the time.

Fortunatly so far Ive muddled through without ending up on you tube or the 9 oclock news. Is there any wood around, I feel the need to touch some.

 

[toad_oftoadhall]

I think it's possible if anyone has the time or inclination, to place the collision with considerable accuracy from the video evidence plus AIS track, by elaborating post #321, (using charts, Google earth etc to plot the transits precisely). The only thing that would scupper this is if the camera was up the hill somewhere, not as seems most likely, on the Esplanade. I'd also make an assumption that the AIS position represents the bridge of the Tanker, in the absence of any other info.

I can't be bothered to really sort it out in any detail but the incident clearly happened East of a line between the Cardinal (Gurnard, we're told) and Fawley Chimney.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_tUoUxzt9sI

FWIW I don't think knowing the exact position of the crunch helps much.

What we're missing is Atlanta's POV.

 

[Uricanejack]

On the other hand, this was a widely reported incident involving a laden tanker in confined waters close to a major population centre and a "rich man's toy" racing yacht. The latter sustained major damage and lost a man overboard in circumstances which could easily have led to his death. Had the authorities not been seen to have acted formally, there would have been an outcry from the media and quite possibly from various shroud wavers and other shoulder-chip carriers which might well have led to serious if uninformed criticism of our leisure pastime and possibly the imposition of unwelcome and unnecessary regulation. Whatever the outcome of the trial, there are useful lessons for all concerned and for the wider seafaring community. In my view the trial is the least worst way of dealing with this, and will probably be followed by the release of a MAIB report which will tell us what ACTUALLY happened rather than the conflicting and, it seems to me, sometimes mutually exclusive perceptions of Monday morning quarterbacks.

Unfortunatly. Some jobs worth at the MCA decided this was the way to deal with the incident. There is no MAIB report. There is no mention by the MAIB there is a investigation under way or a report pending.
there probabaly was some kind of internal investigation by the port. it does not apear to be in the public domain.
The only public process is this trial.
which will only answere one question. Guilty as charged or not.

An MAIB report would have been a much better way of dealing with this and probabaly cheeper.

If you are paying dues to the RYA maybe its worth while asking why they are not putting preasure on the authorityies to investigate rather than prosecute and making a lot of noise about it.

 

[Uricanejack]

I think it's possible if anyone has the time or inclination, to place the collision with considerable accuracy from the video evidence plus AIS track, by elaborating post #321, (using charts, Google earth etc to plot the transits precisely). The only thing that would scupper this is if the camera was up the hill somewhere, not as seems most likely, on the Esplanade. I'd also make an assumption that the AIS position represents the bridge of the Tanker, in the absence of any other info.

yes it is and surprisingly good. unfortunatly it is unlikly there is available any public recording of the AIS infor the day and the location 2 years after the fact.
The port and VTS should have this. it may be used as evidence.
The Tanker may have had a VDR. Voyage Data Recorder.
The Tanker will have had a deck log and bridge movment or note book along with course recorder and engine movment recorder.
If it had an ecdis the positional information may have been saved
although none of the above is required on the sail boat.
Many if not most sail boats tacking part in serious racing probabaly have more up to date electronics than comercial vessels.
much of which woulkd contain hard drives or memory of the event.

Some of this may be entered into evidence but if not heard yet it was probabaly not retrieved at the time.

 

[l'escargot]

I think it's possible if anyone has the time or inclination, to place the collision with considerable accuracy from the video evidence plus AIS track, by elaborating post #321, (using charts, Google earth etc to plot the transits precisely). The only thing that would scupper this is if the camera was up the hill somewhere, not as seems most likely, on the Esplanade. I'd also make an assumption that the AIS position represents the bridge of the Tanker, in the absence of any other info.

If you look at post #237 you will see a picture I took a couple of days ago standing at the point from which I am reasonably confident the video was taken from on the Parade, the transit line would be the same whatever the height of the camera. The difficulty is getting the range information to place it on that transit line.

 

[Grumpybear]

Unfortunatly. Some jobs worth at the MCA decided this was the way to deal with the incident. There is no MAIB report. There is no mention by the MAIB there is a investigation under way or a report pending.
there probabaly was some kind of internal investigation by the port. it does not apear to be in the public domain.
The only public process is this trial.
which will only answere one question. Guilty as charged or not.

An MAIB report would have been a much better way of dealing with this and probabaly cheeper.

If you are paying dues to the RYA maybe its worth while asking why they are not putting preasure on the authorityies to investigate rather than prosecute and making a lot of noise about it.

I am not a RYA member, having decided many years ago that on almost all issues which mattered to me it was taking a line with which I disagreed, and concentrating most of its effort on issues which did not matter to me. My opinion has changed slightly since then, but not enough to impel me to rejoin. As a corollary, I refrain from criticism of the RYA.

My point was and is to do with public perception: the trial is primarily to show that the incident is being taken seriously, precisely by making a lot of noise. An MAIB report would not address this specific issue, although I am happy to wait and see if a report is published either by them or by the port authority which might contain lessons for water users. In any case, I doubt any such report would be put in the public domain while legal proceedings continue.