sarabande
Well-known member
isn't the camera issue to do with scan rate and pan being in some sort of conflict ?
Atalanta of Chester/Hanne Knutsen trial
- Thread starter woodstock
- Start date
l'escargot
New member
How many boats do you think actively have to avoid a ship passing through? I think you will find the potential for an accident is actually very small. I go out through and return through that stretch of water nearly every time I go out in a boat. The times there is a ship in it that I have had to actively avoid are very few. The ferry to Southampton crosses the shipping lane at least once, the number of times it actively has to avoid a ship when I have been on it has also been very few. If you compare the shipping channel to a road it would actually be a very quiet country lane with very little traffic passing up and down it in terms of vehicles per hour.
chewi
Active member
So read "very few" as "several".
multiply that by the no. of boats... become lots of of opportunities for collisions, that were all avoided by the skippers, including you.
It takes a VERY low probability and little consequence of it occuring to make a risk negligible.
Collision risk in the solent is not one of them.
toad_oftoadhall
New member
+1
I've sailed all my life, the only friends I've ever lost have been on roads.
You can see how rare these events are - this incident happened in 2011. Hasn't happened in the Solent since. When was the last large ship yach collision in the Solent?
It might not be a non-issue but it's bloody close.
Maybe someone should start a 'have you been involved in a fatal collision with a ship' poll?
l'escargot
New member
You are getting it all out of proportion.
First of all you have to have the commercial shipping to avoid, as I said it's about 10 movements a day off the top of my head. You are then probably looking at half a dozen or less of those during racing hours. Then you need to be in their vicinity when they pass through - boats aren't all milling about in the shipping lane waiting for something to avoid. The skippers haven't avoided the collisions, there hasn't been a ship there to avoid - they are only coming through at a rate of about one an hour.
The consequence of something that is unlikely to happen doesn't raise the risk - the consequence of being hit by car size meteorite would be certain death but the chances of it happening are so small that the overall risk is negligible.
At the end of the day, if the risk wasn't low there would be collisions all over the place and there isn't.
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lw395
Well-known member
Not quite in the solent, but the Ouzo?
Compared to that, this is a case of 'shame about your lump of fibreglass, but this is what we have insurance for'.
chewi
Active member
No I'm not, I'm not overstating it or exaggerating. It is avoidable in my limited experience, but more experience may reveal circumstances I have not seen, rather like HK and atalanta found.
I'm just saying it cant be neglected.
If you neglected it, you would have crashed on your "very few" occasions, but you didn't so you didn't neglect it.
So you didn't think it was negligible on those occasions.
rotrax
Well-known member
Thank you.
Tranona
Well-known member
The number is indeed very small. Every one in recent years involving a British registered ship or in UK territorial waters in the last 15 years or so has resulted in an MAIB report. Less then one a year - and does not run into double figures overall. There is no discernable pattern of causes and none of them (from memory) involved a yacht taking part in an organised race.
Seagreen
New member
"STARBOAAAAAAARD!!! Did they hear us, d'you think?"
blackbeard
Active member
I tried to remember this when I had just crossed a Channel shipping lane and was about to cross the one going the other way - when the visibility, which had been good, deteriorated alarmingly. One assumes, a not uncommon occurrence. I was, shall we say, a bit worried. (Then it cleared - the RELIEF!)
(Later, I got a bigger and better radar reflector, and fitted an AIS receiver.)
And now - back to topic.
LittleSister
Well-known member
But could that be a factor? All the talk so far has been about which course he could/should/did/might have taken, but all the time his 7+ knots were taking him nearer to danger (as far as I can make it out). I can't recall anyone mentioning the possibility of deliberately slowing or stopping to keep out of that danger. It's an option that people are generally resistant to take, and I wonder whether there's a risk that once in a racing mindset it might be forgotten as an option. Of course, if one's racing one doesn't want to slow, but avoiding a collision is, in law, more important than one's placing. Could that be an issue here?
Resolution
Well-known member
I think you are way off course . One thing that yachts racing round the cans are very used to doing is judging where to place themselves in close proximity to other yachts when rounding marks. Often this involves giving way to a yacht which has right of way, sometimes this does involve slowing down for a few moments. The key point that a number of us here have been arguing is that once the tanker started to swing to starboard the Atlanta would have judged that they were slap bang in the way of his curving track. If you look at the photos just before and after the collision you can see that the tanker was indeed turning sharply to starboard in the seconds before the collision.
DownWest
Well-known member
fireball
New member
Didums ... no I don't fancy a speedway bike ... I prefer powering two wheels myself ... Point still stands - know the danger of the sport and take responsibility for your own actions whilst doing it.
I could see that the organisers would have a responsibility if they asked you to do a specific task that was dangerous - in yacht racing that could be setting a race course across a dangerous bar in heavy weather - leaving the skippers no choice as to their course - or perhaps setting a mark too close to the shallows. But for the main we're talking about sailing a boat as fast as possible - that can be dangerous in itself, but the organisers haven't required you to fly the kite or put up full sail - so if you have an accident due to your own actions then its your own responsibility.
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DJE
Well-known member
Anybody heard the verdict?
Spectacular thread drift here chaps.
But I don't seem to be able to find anything about the trial that is less than about 5 days old. Anybody heard any more?
Spectacular thread drift here chaps.
But I don't seem to be able to find anything about the trial that is less than about 5 days old. Anybody heard any more?
toad_oftoadhall
New member
According to the link I posted above:
The case continues on Tuesday 22 October and runs until Friday 25 October.
Read more at http://www.pbo.co.uk/news/535446/trial-of-cowes-week-yachtsman-roland-wilson#704HYG1E48UQiDtT.99
DJE
Well-known member
Thanks. Sorry I tried reading the whole thread but lost the will to live! 
toad_oftoadhall
New member
Thanks. Sorry I tried reading the whole thread but lost the will to live!
Not the slightest need for apology.
toad_oftoadhall
New member
Start of a new conjecture-athon.
My view on what the verdicts should be based on the little we've heard so far'.
Rule 8d - Guilty.
Because although the ship delayed it's turn & made contradictory signals I have no doubt the Atlantas were well aware that it would turn to starboard to go up the Thorn Channel at a time unknown and they utterly failed to keep well away from a situation that was never certain.
Rule 9b & Rule 18 - Not Guilty.
Purely because I don't think the ship was impeded any more than a fly impedes my car when it hits the window. If it turns out a) My definition of impede is wrong b) The ship took any kind of evasive action for Atlanta my view would change.
Rule 5 - Not Guilty
They saw HK, they understood the situation and turned to Starboard which was appropriate that that time. I think there's a chance that something going on on board made them forget about it and give all their focus to the boat such that they'd failed to continue to monitor HK's approach which might make them guilty under rule 5, but I think the chance of this is slight.
Rule 7 - Not Guilty
They clearly made an assessment of some kind and had worked out a collision was possible. As it happens Rule 7 forbids "assumptions" and I suspect they did make an assumption that the ship would turn earlier based on very little information. None the less I think there is reasonable doubt there, so not guilty.
That's my view. What are the verdicts of the other armchair admirals?
My view on what the verdicts should be based on the little we've heard so far'.
Rule 8d - Guilty.
Because although the ship delayed it's turn & made contradictory signals I have no doubt the Atlantas were well aware that it would turn to starboard to go up the Thorn Channel at a time unknown and they utterly failed to keep well away from a situation that was never certain.
Rule 9b & Rule 18 - Not Guilty.
Purely because I don't think the ship was impeded any more than a fly impedes my car when it hits the window. If it turns out a) My definition of impede is wrong b) The ship took any kind of evasive action for Atlanta my view would change.
Rule 5 - Not Guilty
They saw HK, they understood the situation and turned to Starboard which was appropriate that that time. I think there's a chance that something going on on board made them forget about it and give all their focus to the boat such that they'd failed to continue to monitor HK's approach which might make them guilty under rule 5, but I think the chance of this is slight.
Rule 7 - Not Guilty
They clearly made an assessment of some kind and had worked out a collision was possible. As it happens Rule 7 forbids "assumptions" and I suspect they did make an assumption that the ship would turn earlier based on very little information. None the less I think there is reasonable doubt there, so not guilty.
That's my view. What are the verdicts of the other armchair admirals?
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