Paging Waverider, education required

[jonjo]

Waverider you seem like one of the more balanced supporters of the keep out of the way argument in the “Near Collision” thread.

Since MainlySteam has admitted you as an honorary member to his club of maritime professionals and also disbarred me for life, would you be so kind as to educate me?

Take the following scenario...

You are broad reaching eastwards down the Solent at 5 knots in a 30ft yacht between WootonCreek and Portsmouth. 2 miles to port you notice a Wightlink ferry winding its way on a low tide route out of Portsmouth. Your intuition says that the ferry will soon speed up to 15 knots, head your way and create a close crossing situation.

* How close do you let the ferry get in order to confirm a close crossing situation before you decide to voluntarily give way?

* Should the close crossing situation become clear much later, under what distance do you think it is safer to hold your course and let the ferry manoeuvre to avoid you?

Let's assume that in the 2 square miles of sea ahead of you and the ferry there is an assortment of 6 small leisure boats moving under 10 knots and on a variety of headings. Visibility is perfect.

Advice from others is welcome.

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[waverider]

JonJo...I don't think for one moment that MainlySteam would be the type of person to have disbarred you for life........the great thing about forums is that they air opinions and maybe create wiser people! Without looking back through my post's I like other people saw things different and also sympathised with Ians encounter with the Wightlink......to post your situation in words is not the same as being live, so I cannot tell you what I would do except I would chose the safest option! However most sailors today still use hand bearing compass to log positions of larger vessels at timed intervals... the speed and position of the vessel can then be calculated when it will cross your bow.

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[NigeCh]

Nasty sailing places ... The Solent

I don't know of any worser place to sail than the Solent - It's the pitz when you compare it with anywhere else.

Top terrorist free sailing slots are: Chesapeake off Annapolis, Bay of Islands and Dingle in a fine summer.

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[waverider]

Re: Nasty sailing places ... The Solent

NigeCH ......I wouldn't describe it as the pits m8y....but a bloody good area for gaining valuable experience!

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[powerskipper]

The Solent from a learning point of view is great, you can find just about all types of navigational hazards around it,So if you can handle the Solent you should be OK anywhere else.

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Julie

 

[Jools_of_Top_Cat]

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So if you can handle the Solent you should be OK anywhere else.

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As long as you don't go out in any wind I would agree.....



ducks!

<hr width=100% size=1>Julian

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[MainlySteam]

Jonjo, I trust that you will stand a comment from me, and just regard it as what I do, especially if it is just old hat to you.

What I found very helpful for myself was the realisation that everyone does this bearing speed checking thing automatically subconsciously every day. If one walks through a busy shopping mall with people walking in all directions at various speeds we (and others) generally subconsciously adjust our own speed and make subtle changes in direction so that we do not walk into others. Generally we do not walk at a constant speed and direction, we are subtley adjusting all the time, as are most others about us so that we are not continually faced with making unexpected big "course" changes to avoid hitting others. We have no colregs in shopping malls but mostly we avoid walking into each other or having panic stops or course changes. Subconsiously we are aware of the change in bearings to other pedestrians - no change we will collide so we speed up, slow down, or change course, all automatically. In doing that there is a hierarchy, large persons, hostile looking persons, smelly/dirty persons and women (by men) are often cleared astern.

Admittedly it is not so easy in a boat because the distances are greater and our practise is less, but the method is the same.

John

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[Mike21]

That's why Solents so popular with boaters isn't it?/forums/images/icons/smile.gif

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[powerskipper]

Now why is wind a problem, jools! Can't you Handel it,
And the Solent being the Solent there is normally some where that is Windy and somewhere not and I don't just mean the marinas with Indian restaurants in them
And for the more adventurous they can go south of the IOW.

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Julie

 

[waverider]

I shall have to remember that explanation MainlySteam.....what a great answer......in fact bloody excellent!

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[powerskipper]

Nicely put /forums/images/icons/wink.gif

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Julie

 

[jonjo]

Hi MainlySteam, hope your week-end winter sail was fun. I was not expecting your return to Scuttlebutt until tomorrow morning but I had mentally put NZ on the other side of the international date line.

I have to admit that the shopping mall analogy does not fill me with confidence, since I often end up in face-to-face collisions. This can probably be attributed to me being a lefthander.

After much personal research, I have concluded that lefthanders naturally go red-to-red in shopping mall head-on encounters whereas righthanders go green to green. Must be something to do with passing strangers with one's fighting arm at the ready.

Let's just hope that the Wightlink helms are lefthanders!

It is worth noting from PBO that the 1st mate of one Ryde fastcat is a woman, so I will pay particular attention to her stern from now on as you suggest.

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[bedouin]

I think the problem I, and many like me, face is that it can be very difficult to judge the speed / distance of large vessels. We are expert with smaller boats as we have personally experience of them and so can judge fairly accurately their size, distance and speed. Within the confined waters of the Solent it is also easy to judge speeds and distances because all vessels are set against a backdrop of known landmarks.

Out in the Shipping lanes it seems to get much harder, without any external references, when a ship appears at a relative bearing of 60 or 70 degrees I find it hard to judge if it will pass half a mile ahead or half a mile astern (or even worse somewhere inbetween /forums/images/icons/smile.gif)

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[waverider]

Well put bedouin.....there was an article in PBO No448 pg 68......I remember reading (in fact just got the mag out again) although it's about safety in fog it does highlight the errors that can be made in open water.

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[MainlySteam]

I agree although I tend to depend alot on bearings, but usually just across the compass, or by simple observation if the other vessel is fast or close enough. But that has its problems when, as you say, the bearing is well off to the side of ones own course, especially on the open sea with no other landscape to judge relative size and distance by. Also, when sailing, ones own speed may not be constant so a bearing will appear to change and then not.

I am the first to say that it does not always work and as I think you said in the other thread, when it all gets close then colregs have to prevail in order to, hopefully, avoid confusion.

Generally I do not find that I have too much trouble in large harbours or open waters with other frames of reference. In the open sea I tend to treat ships with alot of wariness, even if several miles away, unless it is blindingly obvious that they will clear (we do not carry radar). So far I find that if being conservative, but then thinking I may have got it wrong, I have recognised that before the ship has decided to take any action of its own - although it is likely that their own plot may have shown there was no problem.

A number of times in the open sea we have forced ships to change course to clear, but with plenty of time for them to do so, when we have been forced into our own change to avoid large rips - and a coastal ship once when stopping to land a fish /forums/images/icons/smile.gif - and in every case they have been generous with the room given under those circumstances. If it turns out that one is pretty certain not to clear a ship and the ship hasn't done anything to correct the matter (whether it is stand on or not) then I would have thought that could be recognised sufficiently far off such that any evasive action is not likely to be complicated by any sudden decision by the ship to do the same.

Obviously, I am not talking about a situation in the open sea where there is a sustained close procession of ships.

John

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[NigeCh]

I wonder, wunder woo ....

Is it really a nice place to gain experience ???????? I gave it up over ten years ago to find a better sailing place. It used to take me less than an hour to drive to the Solent and now it takes me 4 hours to drive to where I sail - The long drive is worth it as the sailing is better.

As for the experience, IMO, in and around the Solent area nobody seems to give a stuff about IRPCS or anything else that might impede them .... There's nothing in IRPCS that gives the shout 'RACING' precedence over IRPCS .... IMO, most Solent sailors are a bunch of selfish geeks who ought to learn that sailing on posh yots doesn't give them precedence over any others.

Nige (Farr 50)


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[whisper]

Re: I wonder, wunder woo ....

I can't stand people who hide behind a load of platitudes so as not to come out and say what they really think /forums/images/icons/smile.gif

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[BrendanS]

Re: I wonder, wunder woo ....

Nige, I don't know where you went sailing on the the Solent, but your attitude to it is over helmingly negative (sic). Probably best you left it, as many of us don't see a problem from day to day.

<hr width=100% size=1>Me transmitte sursum, caledoni

 

[Its_Only_Money]

Maybe this is why.....???

Now this might be a bit contentious but I truly feel that some sailors approach IRPCS with the wrong mindset, they come from a background where they have grown up applying Racing Rules to gain tactical advantage at close quarters (eg while rounding a racing mark or at the startline), while racing, first maybe in dinghys and then yachts.... and carry on this attitude of overly-aggressive stand-on vessel whenever a risk of collision exists >whenever< they are sailing. Indeed many racing tactics revolve around working up to being the stand-on vessel at key points in then course and insisting on those rights on the water - and then debating them again potentially after the race. This probably isn't a healthy approach with a VLCC approaching at 25kts....after all there may not be the opportunity to lodge a protest afterwards!

This is of course IMHO and is a conclusion based on my experience, anyone who reads this may have found totally different in their experience.

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Simon
Its Only Money
Fairline Sprint
Solent-based

 

[jonjo]

Re: Maybe this is why.....???

During the Near Collision thread I noticed that a body of powerboaters hold the view that yachtsmen deliberately push the rules and end up in confrontation with large commercial vessels.

This isn’t the case, we simply do not have the manoeuvrability and options that a similarly sized modern powerboat has.

If you had to skipper a 6 ton 35 foot yacht out of Portsmouth on a busy day you would feel that you were in charge of a waterlogged tree trunk.


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