Solent coastguard excessive wash report yesterday

It can be bloody dangerous.

We were on the hook in Osbourne bay, waiting for the tide to ebb. An unloaded tanker-plenty of freeboard showing-went by at over 20 kts. I put the AIS on to ID the vessel and clocked his speed from there.

I called Southampton VTS and told them as my wife had taken a tumble down the companionway due to the 1 metre plus wave caused by the ship.

VTS suggested I was overeacting. I reminded them of their bylaws and said " If you clock it on AIS now, it is still doing almost 18 kts!"

It went quiet............................

They got back to me later and told me they had put a memo out to the Pilots.

Sounds like they need to do another one!
 
...give 'em their due, SolentCG took all the details to pass on.. and yes it was unpleasant enough for that skipper to take the action he did so fair do's..

rotrax said:
It can be bloody dangerous.

We were on the hook in Osbourne bay, waiting for the tide to ebb. An unloaded tanker-plenty of freeboard showing-went by at over 20 kts. I put the AIS on to ID the vessel and clocked his speed from there.

I called Southampton VTS and told them as my wife had taken a tumble down the companionway due to the 1 metre plus wave caused by the ship.

VTS suggested I was overeacting. I reminded them of their bylaws and said " If you clock it on AIS now, it is still doing almost 18 kts!"

It went quiet............................

They got back to me later and told me they had put a memo out to the Pilots.

Sounds like they need to do another one!
Click to expand...
 
Just read the Bylaws, this applies I think...

Speed of vessels

7.(1) No person shall navigate a vessel or operate a personal watercraft –

(a) without due care and caution or at a speed or in a manner which, having regard to all the circumstances at the time,including weather conditions and the type condition and use of other vessels underway, berthed or moored, or which might reasonably be expected to be underway, berthed or moored, endangers the safety of, or causes injury to any person, any other vessel, buoy, moorings, banks of the port or any other property;
Click to expand...


Source:
https://www.southamptonvts.co.uk/admin/content/files/PDF_Downloads/Soton Byelaws.pdf
 
That skipper was me. I've also made a formal written report to CG and MAIB.

The wash was from a commercial heading W out of the Solent, I think with a pilot on board!

It wasn't any form of normal wash. I certainly wouldn't have been concerned if it had been normal, but in 40 years on the water I've seen nothing like it. I've described it as a mini tsunami since the wave front was vertical with breaking crest, and a height I estimated as between 2.5 to 3 m! I know this because the wave crest was about 1 m above the bow of my modern yacht which has the fairly high freeboard associated with the type. The only avoiding action I had time to take was to turn bows on and call for my crew to brace for impact. I assess that if I hadn't made an extreme course alteration and it had reached me beam on that I would have been "knocked down" with unthinkable consequences. As it was the wall of water completely submerged my yacht as far back as the sprayhood and flooded into the cockpit, with some making it's way below. BTW, I'm 11m, and a fairly substantial yacht!

The 20ft open day fishing boat that was drifting nearby had to rapidly start it's outboard and flee at top speed in front of the wave. If he hadn't, it would have been swamped or capsized and there was a very real risk of having people thrown overboard or drowned.

So I don't report things like this lightly.

I ignored the numbnuts who made the thoughtless comment. People that dim as to interrupt safety comms and misuse channel 16 without having the cajones to give their call sign are not worth bothering with.

If anybody else was impacted or a witness might be worth contacting CG to report as well?
 
kev99 said:
That skipper was me. I've also made a formal written report to CG and MAIB.

The wash was from a commercial heading W out of the Solent, I think with a pilot on board!

It wasn't any form of normal wash. I certainly wouldn't have been concerned if it had been normal, but in 40 years on the water I've seen nothing like it. I've described it as a mini tsunami since the wave front was vertical with breaking crest, and a height I estimated as between 2.5 to 3 m! I know this because the wave crest was about 1 m above the bow of my modern yacht which has the fairly high freeboard associated with the type. The only avoiding action I had time to take was to turn bows on and call for my crew to brace for impact. I assess that if I hadn't made an extreme course alteration and it had reached me beam on that I would have been "knocked down" with unthinkable consequences. As it was the wall of water completely submerged my yacht as far back as the sprayhood and flooded into the cockpit, with some making it's way below. BTW, I'm 11m, and a fairly substantial yacht!

The 20ft open day fishing boat that was drifting nearby had to rapidly start it's outboard and flee at top speed in front of the wave. If he hadn't, it would have been swamped or capsized and there was a very real risk of having people thrown overboard or drowned.

So I don't report things like this lightly.

I ignored the numbnuts who made the thoughtless comment. People that dim as to interrupt safety comms and misuse channel 16 without having the cajones to give their call sign are not worth bothering with.

If anybody else was impacted or a witness might be worth contacting CG to report as well?
Click to expand...
Good for you. And thanks for clarifying.
 
kev99 said:
That skipper was me. I've also made a formal written report to CG and MAIB.
Click to expand...
kev - I suspect that Solent CG will have filed a log and done little more. Obviously, if there's frequent repetition or a serious accident, then those logs might tell a story, but my understanding is the watchroom staff aren't really in a position to do much. Not sure you are likely to get any better response from VTS, I'm pretty sure MAIB will just say doesn't meet our criteria. I wonder if you may get a more meaningful action from Maritime - CHIRP

Of course it's possible that the response you get is not the one you want and you will get advised about exclusion zones, listening to VTS for vessel movements etc. however at least you will stimulate a discussion.
 
We’ve had an incident (Western silent again) similar but not as servere He also made it quite clear he was coming though and didn’t give a damn for the cloud of Saturday afternoon sailors he was charging through at 13-15kn, 5 hoots just to let us all know who was the boss.. We didn’t report it, it was during a race, didn’t want to spend the time.
 
kev99 said:
That skipper was me. I've also made a formal written report to CG and MAIB.
Click to expand...
Out of interest where were you and what was the depth? Was it shelving steeply or similar? I am not excusing the wash at all but changes in depth can make a significant difference to wave/wash formation and would be interesting to know if that was a factor.

For info, the RN have a self-imposed speed limit of 18kn inside the Solent (forts to Hurst) and 12kn within a 2nm radius of Prince Consort (IIRC) after an incident may years ago when a enthusiastic Destroyer Captain went down the Solent at a significantly higher speed and caused a lot of complaints from people on the beach.

ABP do seem to think they have complete ownership and unlimited ability to do as they please over the Solent and, having called VTS in the past for other issues, doubt that anything else will happen.
 
Was there a submarine in the area I asked as quite a few years ago we had close encounter with one despite turning into the wash etc we had the deck washed and lost a brush of the hand rail this was in a 40ft cruising yacht
 
rotrax said:
It can be bloody dangerous.

We were on the hook in Osbourne bay, waiting for the tide to ebb. An unloaded tanker-plenty of freeboard showing-went by at over 20 kts. I put the AIS on to ID the vessel and clocked his speed from there.

I called Southampton VTS and told them as my wife had taken a tumble down the companionway due to the 1 metre plus wave caused by the ship.

VTS suggested I was overeacting. I reminded them of their bylaws and said " If you clock it on AIS now, it is still doing almost 18 kts!"

It went quiet............................

They got back to me later and told me they had put a memo out to the Pilots.

Sounds like they need to do another one!
Click to expand...
Well done,ferries seem to be the biggest offenders
 
Anchoured in a recognized anchour age a ferry came though literally digging a hole in the sea next to my boat a forty footer I had the presence of mind to call out for everyone to hold on as the boat tumbled into the hole,being a “ professional “ doesn’t seem to count for much.
 
My Grandmother was on the Beach at Seaview (E Solent) in the 1920's when a big Liner came out of Southampton heading for the Nab at speed. The wash arrived on the beach in the form of large breakers which swept almost to the HW mark. Many people including children were swept off the beach with several fatalaties.. Fortunately she and her family were not actually on the beach - I might not have been here otherwise!

The high speed ferry leaving or entering Poole slows down befroe reaching Old Harry Rocks for the same reason. When it first started operating it would accelerate from Poole Fairway Buoy, and 10 minutes loater a half meter high surge would arrive on Studland Beach, frequently sweeping youngsters in the shallows off their feet though I never heard of any fatalaties

During the Festival of the Sea in Portsmouth circa 2000, a Pilot launch came in fast through the mass of small craft, and close to the crowded beach, creating a large enough wash to be dangerous not only to small craft but kids playing at the waters edge. The VHF came alive with protests, followed by a stunned silence at the reply: "Some of us have a job to do"!

Commercial vessels run to very tight schedules with major financial implications if there are even short delays.
 
scottie said:
Was there a submarine in the area I asked as quite a few years ago we had close encounter with one despite turning into the wash etc we had the deck washed and lost a brush of the hand rail this was in a 40ft cruising yacht
Click to expand...

I used sail on the Gair Loch, Firth of Clyde, in dinghies, sometimes Lasers. It was great fun when Polaris submarines passed by, as they produced tall, rolling waves that we eagerly intercepted or chased to surf down. Great fun.

I fully appreciate the OPs concerns and reporting it as the yachts on the moorings along the Gair Loch got thrown about, with occasional damage.
 
oldharry said:
My Grandmother was on the Beach at Seaview (E Solent) in the 1920's when a big Liner came out of Southampton heading for the Nab at speed. The wash arrived on the beach in the form of large breakers which swept almost to the HW mark. Many people including children were swept off the beach with several fatalaties.. Fortunately she and her family were not actually on the beach - I might not have been here otherwise!

The high speed ferry leaving or entering Poole slows down befroe reaching Old Harry Rocks for the same reason. When it first started operating it would accelerate from Poole Fairway Buoy, and 10 minutes loater a half meter high surge would arrive on Studland Beach, frequently sweeping youngsters in the shallows off their feet though I never heard of any fatalaties

During the Festival of the Sea in Portsmouth circa 2000, a Pilot launch came in fast through the mass of small craft, and close to the crowded beach, creating a large enough wash to be dangerous not only to small craft but kids playing at the waters edge. The VHF came alive with protests, followed by a stunned silence at the reply: "Some of us have a job to do"!

Commercial vessels run to very tight schedules with major financial implications if there are even short delays.
Click to expand...
Two years ago when we were moored in the harbour in Ermoupoli on Syros Island my wife and I ventured across to a rocky cove under the Hermes Hotel. It appeared to be a designated swimming area with steps down to the water, and there were a few people swimming there. After less than 10 minutes in the water a huge wave came crashing in. I managed to grab a rail on the steps but my wife was a bit further out. The wave caught her and threw her up on the rocks directly below the hotel. She managed to grab onto a rock and saved herself from being sucked out again. Apparently the wave was caused by one of the large fast ferries passing just offshore. We never saw the ferry, and weren't aware of that potential danger when we went swimming. It did strike us after the event that there was no one else in the water when it struck. Did they know what was coming and not warn us?
 
You must log in or register to reply here.

Share this page

Top