Angele
Well-Known Member
At the weekend I got my new 2010 Channel Almanac out of its wrapper and, on the approach to Beaulieu River (in the Solent for those not local to the area) opened it to check the chartlet to remind me which beacon I was supposed to line up with Lepe House as a leading line.
Then, remembering the thread on here started a week or so back about favourite places to go on the south coast and comments about the absence of water at the River entrance at low water springs, I thought I would see what Reeds advises about the times when entry is/is not possible.
To my complete amazement, the Almanac says "Entrance possible LW+/- 2". Fortunately I knew that to be complete bo$$ocks, when precisely the opposite is true. It was HW -2 as I entered the river and, although it was springs, we had less than 1m below the keel at its shallowest (draft 2.1m).
On returning home I have checked back through old copies and it appears this error has been there in each of the 2008 and 2009 editions as well as the current one. (Yes, I know I should chuck them out, but I just can't bring myself to do it). You have to go back to 2007 to find the correct advice when there was a rather helpful box giving the key info about the river, starting with the advice: "Ent dangerous LW +/- 2."
How can the editors change an entry from one year to the next and turn something that was right into total misinformation? I would feel very sorry for someone new to the Solent who ran aground at the river entrance by merely following the advice in the Almanac.
Will I be writing to the editors to tell them about the error? Probably not. I wrote to them a year ago to advise of similar misinformation in the entry for Dielette (northern France) - yet again a problem with entry times. I didn't even get an acknowledgement from them, let alone confirmation that there was indeed an error and that it would be corrected.
Now, I still think that Reeds is an excellent product. I just wonder how many errors there are in there that have gone uncorrected for years. Will I find out to my cost at some point in the future when I place my trust in the Almanac somewhere I don't know as the Solent and discover more dodgy advice?
Then, remembering the thread on here started a week or so back about favourite places to go on the south coast and comments about the absence of water at the River entrance at low water springs, I thought I would see what Reeds advises about the times when entry is/is not possible.
To my complete amazement, the Almanac says "Entrance possible LW+/- 2". Fortunately I knew that to be complete bo$$ocks, when precisely the opposite is true. It was HW -2 as I entered the river and, although it was springs, we had less than 1m below the keel at its shallowest (draft 2.1m).
On returning home I have checked back through old copies and it appears this error has been there in each of the 2008 and 2009 editions as well as the current one. (Yes, I know I should chuck them out, but I just can't bring myself to do it). You have to go back to 2007 to find the correct advice when there was a rather helpful box giving the key info about the river, starting with the advice: "Ent dangerous LW +/- 2."
How can the editors change an entry from one year to the next and turn something that was right into total misinformation? I would feel very sorry for someone new to the Solent who ran aground at the river entrance by merely following the advice in the Almanac.
Will I be writing to the editors to tell them about the error? Probably not. I wrote to them a year ago to advise of similar misinformation in the entry for Dielette (northern France) - yet again a problem with entry times. I didn't even get an acknowledgement from them, let alone confirmation that there was indeed an error and that it would be corrected.
Now, I still think that Reeds is an excellent product. I just wonder how many errors there are in there that have gone uncorrected for years. Will I find out to my cost at some point in the future when I place my trust in the Almanac somewhere I don't know as the Solent and discover more dodgy advice?
