Qualifications for a 118 footer !

you can't beat going to the horses mouth for the truth!

I for one believe them and think it is a myth that you need a ticket.
Is it not what the RYA strives to maintain, self regulated yachting?
Obviously I am happy to be corrected in my belief.
 
Lots of myths and half truths quoted on this thread.

Firstly there is no grey area (as implied earlier), the rules are quite clear.

Assuming we are talking a red flag the first port of call is MSN 1802 which among other things covers

"Privately owned yachts, not in commercial use, of 24 metres and over in loadline length and of less than 3000gt used for sport or pleasure and which do not carry cargo and do not carry more than 12 passengers"

which is what we are talking about here.

The minimum manning is then dictated by the type of craft (in this case a motor yacht), area of operation, (lets for the moment assume up to 60NM from a safe haven) and the tonnage.

If over 24m and under 200t then a Yachtmaster Offshore AND a Yachtmaster Coastal are required as deck officers (master and mate) as a minimum. If the yacht is between 200 and 500 tonnes then a Master 500 and a Yachtmaster Coastal are required as a minimum.

Alternatively pleasure vessels can follow LY2 voluntarily which does give them a loop hole but strongly recommends the same level of deck manning as above. It also recommend an engineer for yachts up to 200 tonnes and a 2nd engineer for yachts up to 500 tonne.

To be honest there is so much legislation surrounding yachts of this size that you need a full time Captain to manage it all for you anyway.

In summary lottery winner (super yacht owners) on red flag yachts require a qualified Captain by law not just for convenience.
 
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Doug_Stormforce said:
Lots of myths and half truths quoted on this thread.

Firstly there is no grey area (as implied earlier), the rules are quite clear.

Assuming we are talking a red flag the first port of call is MSN 1802 which among other things covers

"Privately owned yachts, not in commercial use, of 24 metres and over in loadline length and of less than 3000gt used for sport or pleasure and which do not carry cargo and do not carry more than 12 passengers"

which is what we are talking about here.

The minimum manning is then dictated by the type of craft (in this case a motor yacht), are of operation, (lets for the moment assume up to 60NM from a safe haven) and the tonnage.

If over 24m and under 200t then a Yachtmaster Offshore AND a Yachtmaster Coastal are required as deck officers (master and mate) as a minimum. If the yacht is between 200 and 500 tonnes then a Master 500 and a Yachtmaster Coastal are required as a minimum.

Alternatively pleasure vessels can follow LY2 voluntarily which does give them a loop hole but strongly recommends the same level of deck manning as above. It also recommend an engineer for yachts up to 200 tonnes and a 2nd engineer for yacht up to 500 tonne.

To be honest there is so much legislation surrounding yacht of this size that you need a full time Captain to manage it all for you anyway.

In summary lottery winner (super yacht owners) on red flag yachts require a qualified Captain by law not just for convenience.
Click to expand...

Doug

The whole thing is so confusing the MCA didn't know the answer.
Sounds like Red Flag is a bad idea !!
How far do the MCA have jurisdiction ?
 
Captain Ludd said:
Doug


How far do the MCA have jurisdiction ?
Click to expand...

That one (I think!) is quite simple. There is no geographical constraint - it regulates the vessel and crewing requirements for the Flag State (that is British registered). The boat may well have to comply with Coastal State regulations in addition if it is operating in that state's territorial waters.
 
Thanks Doug. I agree there can be no grey area here. Thanks for pointing to the relevant law

Engineer, you said "you can't beat going to the horses mouth for the truth!" Oh yes you can. If you have a complex question about tax, never ask HMRC. If you have a complex question about insurance law, never ask your broker. If you have a complex shipping law question, never ask the MCA. Reason is simple: clever people are not allocated to call centre work, and really clever people do not work in the civil service at all where the salary is capped at £100k. The real racehorses are outside of these organisations, perhaps on this forum for starters :D
 
Captain Ludd said:
How far do the MCA have jurisdiction ?
Click to expand...

On red flagged yachts, anywhere in the world. They have international teams that police red-ensign boats in the Med, for example. Any prosecution is under English law of course, in the UK courts. Incidentally, MCA is a direct prosecuting authority; they do not go through the CPS
 
As Doug says:
"Alternatively pleasure vessels can follow LY2 voluntarily which does give them a loop hole but strongly recommends the same level of deck manning as above"

This is exactly what Captain Ludd has been told by the MCA on the phone. I therefore maintain that the horse's mouth in this situation is correct. I do take your point though and agree that the horse's mouth can often be beaten.

The grey area has been clearly stated in the above post (to my mind) i.e. "the loophole" which is that LY2 can be adopted which does not require certification for private vessels. It would be crazy not to man according to the scales but technically it can be done. This seems grey to me in that it could be done but it shouldn't be!
I am still happy to be corrected on this:)
 
I'm not quite following your logic Engineer. There is no loophole here.

(i) There is law on manning for vessels >24m LL length, summarised in MSN1802 (which, by the way, is merely a guidance note; it is not the actual law. The actual law is in a series of SIs, starting with SI 1997/348 and then a few later amending SIs)
(ii) There is then further law which allows a shipowner to apply LY2 as an alternative

BUT, LY2 itself has minimum manning levels, and doesn't permit a >24m LL length vessel to run with an unqualified crew. You say "LY2 can be adopted which does not require certification for private vessels" but that is not correct. LY2 in its entirety applies to commercial vessels. A shipowner who elects to apply the LY2 alternative is in effect volunteering to be treated as a commercial yacht under LY2 and become subject to the manning requirements of LY2 as if the vessel were commercial vessel even though it's private.

Thus, LY2 isn't a "loophole"; LY2 and SI 1997/348 have differing manning requirements so an owner can pick the one he likes best but both mandate 500t tickets for the boats we're talking about.

As I have said from the start, all this is English law and applies only to red ensign group boats. There are perhaps some flag states around that will offer lighter touch on private vessels so one could always "jurisdiction shop"
 
Philiz said:
Out of interest, how do you know that?
Click to expand...

The boat has been around for years. Not in europe all years (it was in Florida for a while irrc) but it has done some seasons in europe and is listed with plenty of charter brokers. Just google something like "gulf craft phantom" for example
 
My reading of the SI quoted is that if the vessel is a pleasure yacht used soley for that purpose then no restrictions are applied and there are no requirements for certification and/or manning. That is in keeping with the fact that you are not required to register a vessel, unless you want the benefits of registry.

The shipping law has always been lightly applied until things go wrong when there is a flurry for a while to try and sort out the problems to avoid a repeat. So lottery winner buys the Titanic, sails out of port - possibly needing a pilot since that is based on vessel size rather than type - all is hunky dory until it sinks. Enough lifeboats for the family no problems, shortage then the MCA will make recommendations for the future.

Hopefully intellegent winner listens to those around who explain that watch keeping to meet the collision rules requirements, hands for the mooring lines, cooking for those onboard, maintenace etc., will require personnel and then we run into the rules of employment at sea.
 
Mariner69 said:
My reading of the SI quoted is that if the vessel is a pleasure yacht used soley for that purpose then no restrictions are applied and there are no requirements for certification and/or manning. That is in keeping with the fact that you are not required to register a vessel, unless you want the benefits of registry.
Click to expand...

I think you need to read all the SIs to come dsafely to that conclusion. I haven't done that yet, I'm happy to admit

Reading the intro page and para 1.3 of mgn1802 does suggest that somewhere in the SIs there are manning requirements for >24m private boats

Actually para 1.3 doesn't explicitly say you must have a master of a private vessel, but I suspect the courts would interpret that (if necessary) as the person in charge of nav so there isn't really a loophole there

On the registry thing, yes you are correct that you do not need to register so there is a loophole in not registering. But that's no big deal, becuase as I said above you can avoid UK rules altogether by registering on another register. Being unregistered in a big boat isn't a seriously do-able thing, in practice
 
Still feels like the actual answer has not been found here as it now seems that if you read the SI as mariner69 appears to have done, non commercial vessels are not required to have certification or even registration.
I have not read the SI and my comments and understanding only comes from my experience. Before becoming qualified, I have been employed as engineer on >24m yachts as have many other engineers in the industry. On 3 seperate vessels The captains held 3000 ton tickets and management companies were involved. My assumption was that they knew the laws. With one particular vessel this was discussed at great length and the MCA consulted on the matter. This was to ease my concerns about qualifications. I was assured that no quals were required for a pleasure vessel >24m, just that it was recommended to follow the manning scales for commercial yachts.
Maybe it is different for engineering as opposed to deck, but I don't think so.
 
The engineer said:
As Doug says:
"Alternatively pleasure vessels can follow LY2 voluntarily which does give them a loop hole but strongly recommends the same level of deck manning as above"

This is exactly what Captain Ludd has been told by the MCA on the phone. I therefore maintain that the horse's mouth in this situation is correct. I do take your point though and agree that the horse's mouth can often be beaten.

The grey area has been clearly stated in the above post (to my mind) i.e. "the loophole" which is that LY2 can be adopted which does not require certification for private vessels. It would be crazy not to man according to the scales but technically it can be done. This seems grey to me in that it could be done but it shouldn't be!
I am still happy to be corrected on this:)
Click to expand...

Just to clarify, if an owner voluntarily decides to follow LY2 and run as a coded boat there is a loop hole on minimum manning BUT there is no loop hole that negates the master needing the Master 500 ticket (assuming 200-500t). There is no grey area on the masters tickets for super yachts. LY2 is of course more onerous than remaining as a private pleasure vessel anyway.
 
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