Sound signals

[Rigger Mortice]

In nearly 20 years of messing about on the water I have never heard another leisure boater use a sound signal. Not even in fog.
Ferries and the like seem to use them all the time in busy waters, but leisure boaters don't.

Are we missing a useful method of communication or do peeps just not know all the sound signals? Just curious.

 

[Evadne]

I've used the foghorn in the fog, but giving two blasts to tell another yottie that I'm turning left would probably just confuse them. I know the main ones, but if a commercial ship hooted two longs and a short at me when overtaking, then I could probably guess what he meant without having to look it up.

 

[lustyd]

I used the fog signal once. It was THICK fog at night time going from Milford Haven to Holyhead with a F7-F8 behind us. I'll never forget the sailing in fog signal now but the the others I'd have to look up.

 

[Poignard]

In nearly 20 years of messing about on the water I have never heard another leisure boater use a sound signal. Not even in fog.
Ferries and the like seem to use them all the time in busy waters, but leisure boaters don't.

Are we missing a useful method of communication or do peeps just not know all the sound signals? Just curious.

I used my aerosol foghorn in earnest a few years ago.

I had left Alderney single-handed bound for the Needles. After a short time thick fog descended. I was between Alderney and the Casquets TSS. I don't have radar but I have a GPS.

I did not want to go back to Alderney with zero vizibility and neither did I want to get in amongst the ships. There was no wind at all and I shut off the engine and drifted for a few hours, plotting my position on the chart every now and then and smoking cigarillos.

The only thing that bothered me during that time was the sound of a powerful engine and a French pop radio station together with a strong smell of fish. Obviously a trawler was near me so I stood in the cockpit (lifejacket on) tooting away with the foghorn. After a while the trawler cleared off. Whether he heard me, I'll never know.

I have since been told that if I had called up Alderney radio they could have seen me on their radar and guided me into Bray Harbour. (Has anyone here ever had that done?)

Anyway, by the time the fog cleared (very suddenly) I felt I needed a few drinks so I abandoned the cross-Channel passage and high-tailed it to Cherbourg.

 

[laika]

Are we missing a useful method of communication or do peeps just not know all the sound signals? Just curious.

Part of the problem is lack of a "whistle" (horn) on most leisure sailing boats, even the 12m+ ones which are supposed to have them. Most people probably just have an air horn stuffed under the chart table which is not where you need it for manoeuvring. You might think to bring it up to the helm in fog but then it won't last long used every 2 mins and there's the question of whether it could be heard from a ship's bridge anyway.

I'm as shamefully guilty as most people: fitting a horn with a button near the helm and wired up to the VHF (which can do fog signal patterns) has been on my "to do" list for months now.

From hearing people use air horns on yachts on foggy days in the solent, I suspect that more people know the sound signal for a vessel under sail in fog is long-short-short than know the colregs definition of "short blast" and "prolonged blast"

 

[DougH]

Have used the fog horn attached to the Icom radio whilst crossing the Channel in a real pea souper. Very eerie but gave a great reasurance that one was obeying the Colregs.

Have to say the Raymarine HD Radar was superb.

We are in Mallorca and it must be said that a large proportion of boats weave all over the place and around marina entrances things can get very confused.

I do use 'overtaking' and 'I do not understand your intentions' signals and certainly some of the boats (not just UK flagged) do seem to understand, but I have never had a response.

Most appear to take the signal just as a warning.

Most of the Raggies are school boats and when I have had the rare occaision to use any signal you do get an aggressive stare from the pupils who seem to misunderstand what the sounds meant and a thank you wave from the professional Skipper.

 

[Rigger Mortice]

giving two blasts to tell another yottie that I'm turning left would probably just confuse them.

I suspect you're right. On a few occasions I've thought of using my horn but then thought it would only result in some bewildered looks on the other boat.

....and yes; I would have to look some of the signals up

 

[Resolution]

In nearly 20 years of messing about on the water I have never heard another leisure boater use a sound signal.

If you sail/race on the Solent anywhere near the S**sail fleet you will hear plenty of sound signals. Mostly verbal or quasi-vocal, possibly not entirely as envisgaed in the colregs.

 

[Sybarite]

I used my aerosol foghorn in earnest a few years ago.

I had left Alderney single-handed bound for the Needles. After a short time thick fog descended. I was between Alderney and the Casquets TSS. I don't have radar but I have a GPS.

I did not want to go back to Alderney with zero vizibility and neither did I want to get in amongst the ships. There was no wind at all and I shut off the engine and drifted for a few hours, plotting my position on the chart every now and then and smoking cigarillos.

The only thing that bothered me during that time was the sound of a powerful engine and a French pop radio station together with a strong smell of fish. Obviously a trawler was near me so I stood in the cockpit (lifejacket on) tooting away with the foghorn. After a while the trawler cleared off. Whether he heard me, I'll never know.

I have since been told that if I had called up Alderney radio they could have seen me on their radar and guided me into Bray Harbour. (Has anyone here ever had that done?)

Anyway, by the time the fog cleared (very suddenly) I felt I needed a few drinks so I abandoned the cross-Channel passage and high-tailed it to Cherbourg.

I have an air horn you blow into.

The last time I did Scilly/Ushant it was also in thick fog. In the TSS I could hear the boats but could not see them. At least one of them saw me and gave a toot (more an enormous blast) and then loomed out of the fog fairly close. I did a 180° faster than I ever had before. It is especially eery at night time because you have no notion of distances or direction other than that provided by the instruments.

 

[laika]

I have since been told that if I had called up Alderney radio they could have seen me on their radar and guided me into Bray Harbour. (Has anyone here ever had that done?)

Not Alderney and not "guided in" as such but skipper of a radarless boat I was crewing on a few years back did call up Joberg Traffic when we got caught out in thick fog mid-channel. Reassuring to know they were monitoring us into Cherbourg and we did hear them talking to a couple of vessels on our behalf.

Main lesson learned was probably "don't go out without radar when there's any significant chance of fog" but the secondary one was if caught out, notifying the local VTS or coastguard of your situation is probably a smart move.

 

[Dave_Seager]

Horn signals are used regularly on the River Thames, mostly by the professionals but we use them quite often as well.

 

[My_Owd_Transom]

I gave the RedJet 5 blasts when I was motoring up the medina earlier in the season. I was inbound pinned on the starboard side of the channel by the car ferry, coming in about 15m to my port to when 150m from Redjet he sounds his horn and starts to pull away with the intention of squeezing between me and the car ferry... he took the hint it wasn't happening and gave an apologetic wave when there was eventually room for him to get past...

 

[john_morris_uk]

Not sure why I should feel slightly embarrassed to admit that we have used our fog horn quite a few times. In fact as soon as it is foggy, son is asking if he can get it out and start blowing the darn thing.

Lung powered, made of brass etc and very loud.

He gets fed up after a while and I have to take over - although I usually don't bother unless the radar says that there is a vessel nearby.

Despite having radar, we try not to sail in fog, so the thing doesn't get too much use. Unfortunately sailing round the N Brittany coast, you can't avoid the fog all the time.

 

[Hadenough]

I used my aerosol foghorn in earnest a few years ago.
I have since been told that if I had called up Alderney radio they could have seen me on their radar and guided me into Bray Harbour. (Has anyone here ever had that done?)

Yep, Ille d'Ouessant, our radar failed, just after the TSS luckily and the fog came down. The radar tower talked us onto (literally) the dolphin in Porz Ligoudou. We couldn't see the dolphin until we were almost on it and couldn't see the harbour itself untill the following morning when the fog dissipated.

 

[maxcampbell]

5 blasts

Just love the full description of the justification of using 5 short blasts - something like, "I don't sufficiently understand your intentions to allow me to take avoiding action".

I was on the receiving end of 5 short blasts from a Thames Clipper on the tidal Thames, when, in fact, because he was trying to get across us to past to our stb, I would have given him 5 if i'd been more assertive.

Big boats blast first.

As for the rest of the meanings... I have enough trouble working out which way to leave green buoys.