"UK frigate shadows Russian warship in North Sea..."

[Boo2]

From the BBC's website here:

But, just in case it's already been posted, I'm specifically interested in what rules of the sea apply to such encounters ? Is it strictly colregs ? Or does something closer too the racing rules apply ? "Mast abeam" and all that

Boo2

 

[Capt Popeye]

From the BBC's website here:

But, just in case it's already been posted, I'm specifically interested in what rules of the sea apply to such encounters ? Is it strictly colregs ? Or does something closer too the racing rules apply ? "Mast abeam" and all that

Boo2

Humm I understand that the covert rules apply in these cases, each and every War Ship pretends that the others are not there whilst monitoring each others signals and telecommunications systems ?

 

[lpdsn]

I thought 'Mast Abeam' was last used by Nelson at Trafalgar.

I'm sure technically the IRPCS apply more or less. The protest committee have a big building in New York but in this case both sides have a veto.

 

[Daydream believer]

Just as well it is not an American doing the shadowing. They would be likely to ram them & start WW3

 

[dunedin]

Just as well it is not an American doing the shadowing. They would be likely to ram them & start WW3

Nah, it’s only unarmed cargo ships that the US Navy thumps into (and the cargo ships generally come off better)

 

[jac]

Just as well it is not an American doing the shadowing. They would be likely to ram them & start WW3

Assuming the septics could find it. They'd be more likely to ram some innocent French tanker, believe it was Dutch, fire some rounds off at the RNLI for approaching aggressively and then denounce the iranians in the UN for the whole affair.

 

[Daydream believer]

What happened to the Russian trawlers? Or do they just look on Youtube now?
I did hear that since the EU raped our fishing waters it was a little difficult to justify their existence. However, since everyone knew they never went fishing that would be that pretty irrelevant anyway.

 

[EdWingfield]

Perhaps the Russians are checking to see if we have any warships left?

 

[lpdsn]

Nah, it’s only unarmed cargo ships that the US Navy thumps into (and the cargo ships generally come off better)

Don't underestimate the skill and igenuity the USN showed in getting rammed by cargo ships. Many other navies would've been put off by the cargo ship heading away from them, but not the USN. They chased after it, overtook, maybe even gave a little wave and then once they'd got their noses in front they turned across the bows and got rammed.

 

[Frogmogman]

"Perhaps the Russians are checking to see if we have any warships left?"

Ha ha. Indeed.

One of my friends has a great story from 1985 when he was serving as an officer on HMS Newcastle, one of 17 (yes, seventeen) HM ships shadowing Soviet naval exercises up in the Arctic circle.

Newcastle was closely shadowing the aircraft carrier Kiev, which was conducting flying operations. This was annoying the Russians (to say the least), who had made several attempts to ram Newcastle.

A Yak 38 Forger aircraft (the Soviet equivalent to the Harrier) coming into land realized that there was another aircraft below it also making an approach, so he pulled out violently putting his plane into a vertical climb. The pilot ejected horizontally (as the Forger was vertical at the time), landing in the sea a cable off Newcastle's beam. Newcastle's Gemini was already in the water, so they zipped over, got the unconscious pilot out of his ejector seat and clipped him onto the winch cable of the soviet rescue helicopter which had by that stage arrived.

Bill tells me that the Captain of Kiev broke protocol to call Newcastle's captain on the VHF to thank him for saving their pilot.

Flight magazine published a report of the incident at the time, but in the absence of a horizon printed the photo (supplied by one of HMS Newcastle's crew) 90° out, so showing the pilot ejecting vertically rather than horizontally).

https://www.flightglobal.com/pdfarchive/view/1985/1985 - 2348.html?search=HMS Newcastle

 

[Daydream believer]

Perhaps the Russians are checking to see if we have any warships left?

Well we have not got many fishing boats left so no point looking for them !!!!!

 

[oldgit]

I did hear that since the EU raped our fishing waters it was a little difficult to justify their existence. .

Did hear some scurrilous rumors that many UK fisherman did quite nicely out of flogging their quotas to other EU fleets,then taking the money and running.
Got to be fake news of course.

 

[Mark-1]

"Perhaps the Russians are checking to see if we have any warships left?"

Ha ha. Indeed.

One of my friends has a great story from 1985 when he was serving as an officer on HMS Newcastle, one of 17 (yes, seventeen) HM ships shadowing Soviet naval exercises up in the Arctic circle.

Newcastle was closely shadowing the aircraft carrier Kiev, which was conducting flying operations. This was annoying the Russians (to say the least), who had made several attempts to ram Newcastle.

A Yak 38 Forger aircraft (the Soviet equivalent to the Harrier) coming into land realized that there was another aircraft below it also making an approach, so he pulled out violently putting his plane into a vertical climb. The pilot ejected horizontally (as the Forger was vertical at the time), landing in the sea a cable off Newcastle's beam. Newcastle's Gemini was already in the water, so they zipped over, got the unconscious pilot out of his ejector seat and clipped him onto the winch cable of the soviet rescue helicopter which had by that stage arrived.

Bill tells me that the Captain of Kiev broke protocol to call Newcastle's captain on the VHF to thank him for saving their pilot.

Flight magazine published a report of the incident at the time, but in the absence of a horizon printed the photo (supplied by one of HMS Newcastle's crew) 90° out, so showing the pilot ejecting vertically rather than horizontally).

https://www.flightglobal.com/pdfarchive/view/1985/1985 - 2348.html?search=HMS Newcastle

Terrific story, thanks for sharing. I must confess I'd mentally filed it under 'apocryphal' until I got to the link to the PDF.

 

[Daydream believer]

Did hear some scurrilous rumors that many UK fisherman did quite nicely out of flogging their quotas to other EU fleets,then taking the money and running.
Got to be fake news of course.

Can you blame them? If their quota was too small to make a living they sell it to some other EU boat to add to their quota so that they have enough to earn a living- fishing our waters. It really was the only option our fishermen had as they could not compete even if they could buy the other quotas.
The stupidity of the EU rules meant that a modern fishing boat built in Eyemouth never fished British waters, but was subsidised not to fish. The local RNLI cox told me that it was then sold to the Portugese, to actively use ( fortunately at a profit to the family!!). Probably fishing our waters right now !!!!!!!

 

[fisherman]

Did hear some scurrilous rumors that many UK fisherman did quite nicely out of flogging their quotas to other EU fleets,then taking the money and running.
Got to be fake news of course.

This is rather along the lines of the second home thing, "Who sold the houses in the first place?". You own something that is part of your capital base, you put it on the market, a dealer buys it, you don't know where it will end up.
Quotas and licences should have no monetary value, but unfortunately no one did anything to stop the trade. If I sell a licence I have not much choice on who ends up owning it, I have to sell at the market price. My boat, for sale now, value £60k, £30k of which is the licence. (In Ireland the licence would cost £108k) Licences are, like houses, now seen as an investment vehicle, with boats laying idle as the licence value increases 4%pa, hedge funds are buying up quotas, fishing companies and dealers are sitting on quota to cut down landings and drive up prices. Attempts by some overseas authorities to stop the trade in licences resulted in big fishing interests threatening court action. The government could decree tomorrow, or next week or after Brexit that no licences will be traded and all must be returned. At the moment we have a situation with bass entitlement that must stay with the boat and cannot be traded: this will mean a lot of old decrepit boats being kept going in the future. Shellfish entitlement cannot be traded separately, you have to buy a licence with shellfish attached, which may also have wet fish above 300kg pa....or not. It's a mess.
Sorry for the drift: fishermen always get it in the neck, if there was more interest we might have had the management we needed since 1973. I suspect that we are about to be given away in Brexit same as we were in Brentry.