Interesting incident on passage West

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TheBishop

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Last weekend I moved my Trader 50 from Southampton to Plymouth . We overnighted in Yarmouth, left at 0600 on Saturday and via the Needles Channel, and standing well offshore Portland Bill we were in Dartmouth around 1400. Cruised at 1800, which gave us 12kts SOG. Next morning we cleared Dartmouth Town Quay by 0900 and were home and hosed in Plymouth by lunchtime.

Weather uneventful, sea pleasant apart from the Needles Channel where both the Bridge and Shingles were a mess of breaking water with a nasty swell to get through to break out into clear water. Could have gone via the North Channel but at least I wont be seeing that stretch of water for a while!

However, when south and west of the Bill and heading across Lyme bay I had an interesting incident.

I have all the toys and both AIS and radar were showing a big mother coming up dead astern several miles back. Both showed CPA at about 300 metres. I identified her on AIS as the ferry Cotentin and at about a half a mile distant I called him up and asked if they were ok with me holding speed and course. They said " Bien sur! " and duly overtook me at about 330m to Port.

All fine and seamanlike I hear you say. But I tell you this. With instruments it was worrying, worrying enough for me to call up; at night with instruments I might have called earlier; in fog with instruments ditto ;and without instruments I would have been in brown trousers.

Couldn't quite understand why he wasn't standing off me by a mile or more as there was noone else around......


Comments?


The Bishop
 
...but I think what was in the back of my mind was the incident off IOW with the ferry ( or vessel unknown ) and the small yacht that was almost certainly swamped and downflooded with the loss of all three crew.

The Bishop
 
TheBishop said:
...but I think what was in the back of my mind was the incident off IOW with the ferry ( or vessel unknown ) and the small yacht that was almost certainly swamped and downflooded with the loss of all three crew.

The Bishop
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Methinks you're referring to the yacht Ouzo.

Nice to see the toys doing the job though. I've never seen AIS as a hugely valuable instrument on a boat fitted with radar, but this is one of those times when it's comforting, at least, to be able to identify and contact the closing vessel.
 
TheBishop said:
However, when south and west of the Bill and heading across Lyme bay I had an interesting incident.

I have all the toys and both AIS and radar were showing a big mother coming up dead astern several miles back. Both showed CPA at about 300 metres. I identified her on AIS as the ferry Cotentin and at about a half a mile distant I called him up and asked if they were ok with me holding speed and course. They said " Bien sur! " and duly overtook me at about 330m to Port.

The Bishop
Click to expand...

Intrigues me as to why she was in Lyme Bay at all. Obviously well off her usual route - Poole/Cherbourg
 
I would say that 300+ metres is a pretty reasonable amount to miss you by. The big ferries passed a lot closer than that inside Poole harbour and didn't seem to think that anyone should get worried - just so long as the wake didn't swamp you they seemed to think any miss was as good as a mile.

AFAIR Ouzo went down because it was a night passage, they had no-one on watch and the no proper lights or RADAR reflector either, so the big ferry that caused their loss got so close before realising she was there that they couldn't properly see whether they had missed or hit her from the bridge - a very different situation to the one that you were in.
 
strakeryrius said:
I would say that 300+ metres is a pretty reasonable amount to miss you by. The big ferries passed a lot closer than that inside Poole harbour and didn't seem to think that anyone should get worried - just so long as the wake didn't swamp you they seemed to think any miss was as good as a mile.

AFAIR Ouzo went down because it was a night passage, they had no-one on watch and the no proper lights or RADAR reflector either, so the big ferry that caused their loss got so close before realising she was there that they couldn't properly see whether they had missed or hit her from the bridge - a very different situation to the one that you were in.
Click to expand...

Who had nobody on watch, did you mean the OOW who had the wrong glasses on
 
I heard a story about 20 years ago from the shipping lanes in northern Bass Strait.
A yachtie, seeing a ship approaching at night, called on his VHF, and asked how the yacht appeared as a visible target on the ships radar.
The response from the bridge was, "just a moment sir, I'll turn it on and let you know" :eek:

Not long before that, the large bridge in Hobart (Tas.) was carved in two by a ship, whose captain was extremely drunk.


Hopefully those days are well behind us.
 
strakeryrius said:
<snip>

AFAIR Ouzo went down because it was a night passage, they had no-one on watch and the no proper lights or RADAR reflector either, so the big ferry that caused their loss got so close before realising she was there that they couldn't properly see whether they had missed or hit her from the bridge - a very different situation to the one that you were in.
Click to expand...

Your recollections are somewhat incorrect i believe. It was never established whether the Ouzo had a watch keeper, as all the crew drowned. (Although it might be fair to assume she didn't, given the apparent lack of avoiding action) They were reported to have had the correct lights, the ship that allegedly swamped them claimed to have seen the nav lights just after the near miss. She also had a radar reflector onboard, but as the boat has never been recovered, it is not know if she had it raised.

The case of the Ouzo does though highlight how valuable AIS could be on small yachts, where they perhaps wouldn't run the radar due to power considerations.
 
300m is fairly normal distance to pass (safely).
Expecting a very large ship to pass you by as much as a mile is a bit of a tall order. It will cost an awful lot extra in fuel and (relatively speaking) be quite a work up to change course etc so a simple safe distance of 300 or 400m should be fine.

As has been pointed out and as you did, keep a good watch and if you are worried the ship will not mind being called up.
 
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