The main issue is that in Benelux and Germany, Ch31 is the new marina channel away from the VDES data channels, but in the UK 31 is not on a normal ship's licence, it's reserved for the RNLI. So a UK vessel needs a Notice of Variation before they can have Ch 31 added and can't have it accessible in UK waters.
I would have thought that most of the people who work for the RYA are of normal working age, and as you say, probably a lot younger than a significant number of us forumites
No I didn’t st599 did.
Which Luckyduck and RunAgroundHard clarified its geographic scope:
With RAH using the technically correct description of “to sea” and “categorised waters”
I’m not trying to catch you out at all - you just seem to be confused about your legal obligations. Of course that leads to the ambiguous question of what “appropriate” means - the sort of question that we might turn to our national governing body to help determine?
I won’t stoop to making personal insults - but I will continue to point out when I believe you are wrong, because when I see something that seems misleading I think it’s right to go to the source and correct it - which is what I would have done had I had the concern you presented in the OP.
You probably would, you seem to lack the ability to think critically. Most people in charge of a vessel would mange just fine though.
I was the one who clarified that passage plans aren’t strict, paper based, or onerous. Keep digging though, you’re doing really well
Why does it matter so much to you that I don’t make firm plans? You seem way too invested in my boating activities. No, I don’t make plans for every use of my boat. Yes, sometimes I do just pootle about. No, the authorities are not knocking down my door and neither have I had a major incident.
Who said anything about “firm” - once again you are twisting the “goal posts”. Although the vaguer the plans potentially the more reason to have appropriate navigation information available!
you broadcast your boating activities on the internet; if you don’t want people to discuss them don’t tell us.
i don’t really believe that - when you slip the dock you presumably have a thought of where you are going to pootle about, how deep the water is, what the weather is doing and if there’s any hazards to be aware of? You presumably have some notion of how long you might be out for and whether you are coming back to your starting point (and any tidal restrictions on that) or if you might go somewhere else. A plan can have options. A plan can change. At some point, you have presumably considered a chart of the area - even if that was so long ago and so familiar you have it embedded in your mind? How would you know if there were significant changes? Given you sail mostly with your wife/partner, do you not discuss the “plan” or is she just a passenger?
Good, I hope you don’t. As you’ll be well aware they don’t tend to pay any interest until something goes really badly wrong - but then they increasingly don’t say “sometimes shit happens at sea” they say “someone must be criminally responsible”. All the more so for commercial craft. The RYA have doubtless played a key role in ensuring that unlike many countries the regulatory involvement for people like you and me is light touch. They also seem to be relatively good at mitigating regulatory encroachment into sailing schools, charter operators etc.
If your original point was that you don’t understand how sailing is (light touch) regulated in the UK or the RYA’s role in that - then I think I am!
We find it impossible to keep enough paper charts on board for unfamiliar territory both from a space and expense perspective.
How did people manage in the days before plotters on far smaller boats than yours?
you can maybe see why people thought you did when you said:
My impression when I last did any serious boat shopping was there were still quite a lot of older boats around without a chart plotter, or with a chart plotter which can't have been updated in the last 10 yrs because the charts are not available.
Are you sure? The user experience between say Navionics and OpenCPN is very different. Does the "sat nav generation" understand how to set up Navionics (etc) to safely autoroute? The difference between using an "old" plotter and a touch screen are quite different. Orca is an interesting competitor to Navionics which adds tidal calculations to your plans - would it be obvious to someone who's never done it by "hand"? I think Savvy Navvy does too - but no idea if it gets it right. At the other end of the scale Memory Maps is pretty basic - is it good enough.
Which systems did they teach with? How do they (or the instructor) view autorouting?
I use both - not because I'm a "hold out" but because I find a large chart far nicer for big picture planning on and an electronic plotter simpler for execution.
So is it not appropriate for the RYA to discuss what a "paperless" navigation world would look like? Contingencies/backups, what the minimum acceptable screen size is, how often the electronics need updated etc. And as someone pointed out a few pages ago - which elements/symbols must be displayed, which data sources should be considered trustworthy enough etc.
There has been lots of debate, so much so we have working products and practices that have been in use for decades. Those that decided not to participate may be upset by that, but we are where we are. They’re free to have their own little committee meetings and discuss, but it won’t change a lot.
Decades is a slight exaggeration - Navionics Boating app was launched less than 12 years ago, Savvy Navvy less than 9. The iPad itself and even iOS and Android smartphones are less than 2 decades old. There has been growing acceptance of their use in the leisure market (I use a waterproof Android tablet as my main in cockpit navigation), but I don't see them being used on commercial vessels.
I'm not aware of any serious "debate" on their use on commercial vessels? What was the conclusion? I ask because despite their obvious utiity the MCA have some quite strong words about the risk of distraction from the use of mobile phones on the bridge of ships and I think that is a reasonable concern.
But it will make you irate if anyone with any sort of official-type role gets involved.
Who mentioned apps? You’re continually coming in with random gibberish, it’s like talking to a very bad AI.
Commercial vessels use ECDIS, not apps.
I know! That’s kind of the whole point of the thread! Small commercial vessels currently don’t use ECDIS because it’s too complex and expensive for a charter yacht, 9m RIB, Fishing vessel, Fishfarm service vessel etc. So they have been stuck in what you might call a legacy mode of “paper” based charts being their official source of navigation. The RYA’s “digital first” stuff that riles the OP is in response to UKHO changes which are coming and will phase out printed charts. The UKHO is presenting a proposal to the IMO on an international standard for digital navigation in the small craft sector - my question is, will that be for hardware based devices or will it encompass the app based plotting which already has some traction in the leisure sector. I don’t expect anyone here to know the answer, but I would hope that the RYA might be feeding thoughts to the UKHO, who may well be less grounded in the reality of operating small vessels.
I did in post 72 and you replied to it saying it’s been around for decades and the debate is over!
Many commercial/coded vessels use widely available plotters from the likes of Garmin, Navico and Raymarine. Many also have unused paper charts on board to comply with a pointless and out of date regulation. I dare say a few do use Navionics on a phone while having paper charts unused in a locker.
