Plomong is still alive by the grace of

P

Plomong

Well-Known Member
Joined
7 Feb 2006
Messages
1,977
Location
Bilbo, Spain (Basque Country, actually)
Visit site
God and the Blessed Virgen.

Early on Friday morning, about 0300, on a northerly course, crossing the south-west going traffic stream in the Channel somewhere between Ushant and Scilly Isles (can give the GPS coordinates). For some time I had been watching closely the eratic movements of two white lights close together
and some distance off the starboard bow, the left one lower than the other. I was on port tack, with a good wind from the NW.

There were no other lights visible on the other vessel, no red sidelight, nothing. Initially I thought she must be on a course nearly parallel with ours, when suddenly I noticed both lights getting bigger, and moving apart quite rapidly. Got the binos on her and saw her bow wave just 5 boat lengths slightly off the starboard bow, nearly dead ahead !!!!!

Tacked through 180 degrees and motor on for good measure ... ... ...

Looked back and saw the effects of her emergency turn to starboard -- her stern was bearing down on us, with her rudder clearly visible. She then did an emergency turn to port, turned on all her lights, and proceeded down channel as though nothing at all had happened.

A real brown-trouser moment, Was shaking so much I could not write anything clear in the deck log for nearly an hour.

What seems to have happened is she was stopped in mid-channel a bit north of the traffic stream doing some unloading and then made a turn down-channel to proceed on her way. She only had two spot lamps on, both below the bridge, one lower than the other. No navigation lights, no sidelights, no all-round masthead light, no all-round light at the bow, until after the incident.

Lesson to be learned (again)?? Be vigilant, very alert, and watch them like a hawk, or else ....

Plomong
 
I wonder what she was unloading too, may be the cause of the distraction then panic on being discovered ?!

I once had a small coaster come bounding past, just W of the Casquets, when it was abeam we were able to see straight through the weelhouse; no one there !
 
Cymrogwyllt said:
close one.


Wonder what she was unloading;)
Click to expand...

Ask the other two boats, both fishing boats, that seemed to leave her a short while before the incident.

Until the lights moved and grew bigger I had thought the vessel was stopped or moving in parallel with us and about to go astern of us, judging by the relative movements of her lights. When I looked in the binos and saw they were deck spotlamps, I got really suspicious as to her intentions, so was trying to figure out what was going on when I saw her bow-wave. Appeared to be some sort of bulker, travelling light -- Could see the black topsides and quite a bit of red-brown anti-fouled hull sides.

Pitch black night, no moon yet, just starlight.

Plomong
 
Yes I wonder what she was unloading or picking up I would report to HMC&E with co-ords How big was the other vessel?

Anyway glad you got out of it OK
 
To get an experienced sailor shaken up like that shows she was close; and - as seems quite likely - if up to no good you may be lucky not to have been 'taken out' as a witness, something I suspect has happened to a few boats which have mysteriously gone missing.

Maybe this thought is the root cause of what sounds like delayed shock; no shame in that, it's a measure of being aware !

This is where a discreet camera with night vision comes in; no longer expensive military kit, and the night vision is rather handy at times.

VHF would be inadvisable, so it's either a sat-phone or wait until range of a mobile...
 
blinking heck, thats a bit too close for comfort. Being unlit sounds a bit dodgy. Presume no AIS or Radar?

I must admit I'd feel uncomfortable in shipping lanes without radar.
 
A few years ago on my delivery passage from Plymouth to Ireland, 1st night I was off watch and asleep, woken up when the boat tacked, wasn't suppose to do that, hurried on deck asking crew what was happening and we were about 20 yards from a large freighter with no lights of any kind on. The night was pitch black and crew claimed not to have seen it.
I had trouble sleeping after that until the end of the trip.
 
Crossing Ionian, I came up on deck at about 4am to take my watch. The only thing of interest, as told to me by the person coming off watch (and bear in mind we had no wind and engine was pushing us at 7kn) was that we must be drifting to port due to a strong current as the island to the left was getting close but he thought we would clear it.....

Cue binos...I could clearly see the bow wave...throttle full...high speed ferry passed about 30 yards astern.

He wasn't left on his own again just in case.
 
reddragon2 said:
Crossing Ionian, I came up on deck at about 4am to take my watch. The only thing of interest, as told to me by the person coming off watch (and bear in mind we had no wind and engine was pushing us at 7kn) was that we must be drifting to port due to a strong current as the island to the left was getting close but he thought we would clear it.....

Cue binos...I could clearly see the bow wave...throttle full...high speed ferry passed about 30 yards astern.

He wasn't left on his own again just in case.
Click to expand...

At night distances can be deceptive! I recall about 4am one morning when I was singlehanded in Lyme Bay seeing a large ship on collision course with me , took me 5 minutes to work out it was the village lights on the top of Portland Bill!
 
jimi said:
At night distances can be deceptive! I recall about 4am one morning when I was singlehanded in Lyme Bay seeing a large ship on collision course with me , took me 5 minutes to work out it was the village lights on the top of Portland Bill!
Click to expand...

And I bet those 5 mins were filled with dread and worry - but the relief when you realise your mistake is immense, and then you feel like a prat (or idiot - oh no, we've moved on from that haven't we) . I certainly did when I did similar.
 
jimi said:
.....took me 5 minutes to work out it was the village lights on the top of Portland Bill!
Click to expand...

I was thoroughly bemused, crossing Mounts Bay from The Lizard in the wee sma' hours of a December morning, by the expanse of shore lights I could see. I knew where Penzance, Newlyn and Mouz'l should be, and could make out the shore road running east towards Marazion, but couldn't for the life of me make out the harbour entrance at any of these 3 small ports in the blaze of red, green and - yes - blue lights I could see.....

....until we got really close, and I worked out that the flashing sequence on the hill above the town looked like a Santa Claus on a sleigh!

Chistmas decorations! The combined waterfront was wall-to-wall Chrissy Fairy lights on scaffolding, flashing, occulting, fixed, interrupted. They entirely hid the expected red-green on the pier ends.


829468_1301943412837.jpg


:cool:
 
Sounds bloody scary, can understand you feeling shaky.

I think you should report it as a near (very) miss. The other vessel may never be identified, then on the other hand it might. Its not your job to work out who they were, or what they were doing there, but there is a small chance that they can be prevented from doing it again.
 
Plomong said:
.... For some time I had been watching closely the eratic movements of two white lights close together
and some distance off the starboard bow, the left one lower than the other...
Click to expand...

I am glad Plomong that all is ok; a brown under pant moment indeed! I am reminded of four events: -

1. Sailing south, to the west of the Mull of Kintyre and noticed this red, occulting light. I could not fathom it out at all. Then it started flashing red, white, red. It only became obvious that it was car going down the hairpin road to the lighthouse when the loom of the headlights shown on the banks of the road.
2. Off Rathlin Island, in fog, close in, a small coastal freighter slipped out the fog about 50' in front and slipped back into the fog. We had being running with alternating silence periods on the engine. We were on one of those silence periods when the shipped crossed our path. I reckon if we had been on a motor period we would have been run down.
3. Again in fog, off Campbell Town the fog lifted and I found myself in the middle of a fishing boat fleet.
4. Tacking south off Cabo Finesterre in rough seas, we stood on as a motor vessel (over 50m) approached. The vessel turned head on at the last minute and after a pause to see if it would continue turning, we tacked clear and sailed on. It was not as close as you, but I could see the bridge quite clearly.

None of the above were as scary as your encounter. I find it very hard to settle off watch with a new crew until I am sure that they understand the need to maintain a proper lookout and not assume anything. The latter is by far the hardest.
 
jimi said:
At night distances can be deceptive! I recall about 4am one morning when I was singlehanded in Lyme Bay seeing a large ship on collision course with me , took me 5 minutes to work out it was the village lights on the top of Portland Bill!
Click to expand...

I too have that T-shirt, having taken avoiding action with a French nuclear power station at 3 am. Fortunately the crew coming on watch had had more sleep than I. OTOH seeing the steaming lights of a small freighter in line, and between her red and green ones was not a moment I'd care to repeat.
 
A sailorman round here recounts being in the south China sea, on watch at night, when he suddenly saw a man sitting on a toilet, for a split second. This happened twice more, then on inspection he realised there was an unlit fishing junk ahead, and the door was swinging open and shut....
 
I really wish I hadn't read this thread before setting of solo. What nightmares are made of. Or perhaps it is good that I've read it, as one certainly won't be complacent after reading it.
 
You must log in or register to reply here.

Share this page

Top