What a dick head!

  • Thread starter Thread starter Chrusty1
  • Start date Start date
"the rules are the rules.... "

Indeed they are, and under the rules it is encumbant on all vessels to do their best to avoid a collision, regardless of who has right of way, but then you know that, do you not?

I just question the sanity of somebody in a perishing dinghy putting themselves in the way of a large commercial vessel. /forums/images/graemlins/confused.gif /forums/images/graemlins/smile.gif
 
oh yes... I know that.... just balancing up the tone of the article slightly, which if read by the unitiated would imply that the skipper of the yacht broke every rule in the book.... which he didn't.... just the first one about not standing on regardless.....

Still think he was a nutter though... /forums/images/graemlins/grin.gif
 
Must have megga gonads though!!

Woooooo-eeeeeeee, respects man! /forums/images/graemlins/grin.gif
 
I just knew that there must be a sensible explanation! /forums/images/graemlins/grin.gif
 
But who was the dickhead in your opinion?

Firstly all credit to the Ferry Captains that have to thread their way through a busy stretch of water with lots of sailing craft with many skippers not sure of the collision regs. There must be occassions where the ferry goes to change course to give way to a sailing vessel and the sailing vessel spills wind/changes course to give way to a large commercial vessel.

In the Solent/Southampton water there is a moveable exclusion zone around large commercial ships (over 150m lg) so this does not apply to Ferries.

Generally I have found the Red Funnel boats do a good job of steering round and anticipating slow pleasure craft but Wight lines can tend to hold their course and try to intimidate small boats.

With my experience of Red Funnel I assume he chose his course to avoid the majority of the pleasure craft and wanted this X boat to notice this but I was not there so cannot judge.

From experience if the X boat had held his course for some while and other pleasure craft did not prevent the ferry from altering course the a Red Funnel ferry would have altered course to go behind. I recognise that the Ferry had the option of slowing/stopping.

As stated i was not there only commenting from experience, can anyone give a fuller description of the exact circumstances.
 
"But who was the dickhead in your opinion?"

If you take the trouble to read my previous posts I think you will know that answer to your question.
 
[ QUOTE ]
He did. read the account properly.

[/ QUOTE ] Not early enough IMO ....
Anyway - do we know if the ferry's captain was seconded from Wightlink? That's normally their trick!
 
Sailor's an idiot

Ferry captain by all accounts left it way late to take avoiding action.

Would rather not sail with either I think.
 
[ QUOTE ]
"But who was the dickhead in your opinion?"

If you take the trouble to read my previous posts I think you will know that answer to your question.

[/ QUOTE ]

I think I have stated enough to cast doubt on your opinion unless there are further facts that we are unaware of.

If the X boat was holding its course in open uncluttered waters he should expect the Ferry to steer to avoid him and maintain as far as practical the col regs. To cap it all the X boat was close hauled on starboard tack!!!

I do not like forcing the issue but find the col regs rather similar to the highway code and best if everyone conforms. I hate it when polite/intimidated drivers give way to lorries trying to pull out from a minor road forcing everyone to brake behind them!

I do indirectly know one Red Funnel Captain who loves sailing and in his time off will often say sail to Cherbourg in his much loved sailing boat have a cup of tea and sandwich and sail back - just for the love of sailing so don't think they are all unsympathetic to sailors.

As I stated in my original reply not enough facts to judge the situation and frankly, surprisingly, this does not occur very often in what is a very busy stretch of water.
 
[ QUOTE ]
In the Solent/Southampton water there is a moveable exclusion zone around large commercial ships (over 150m lg) so this does not apply to Ferries.

[/ QUOTE ]

Whilst the exclusion zone around large shipping, the zone of concern as it is known, is for the >150m lot, I am pretty certain that there is a by-law about merchant traffic in Southampton Water and down to Snowdon. Certainly it is fairly well accepted by everyone I sail with from Southampton.
Indeed a recent open letter from Southampton HM to all the local sailing organisations highlighted a recent trend in near misses and referred specifcally to ferries. Sadly I do not have it to hand and VTS' website appears to be down.
 
There's got to be more to it than is being reported, as the story just doesn't stack up.

If the Ferry captain had anticipated it "some way off" as described he would have just avoided. I have the utmost respect for the red funnel drivers, in my (somewhat extensive) experience of racing boats off Cowes the ferries are very, very good at keeping out of the way of sailing boats.
So I don't buy the "some way off" statement.

Pure speculation, but I can only imagine that the X boat had just tacked, and thus the ferry who was clear suddenly wasn't.

But just speculation as the story and pics just don't stack up to me.
 
Unfortunately this sort of scenario is increasingly common in the Solent. Until not so long ago, IOW feries treated yotties with courtesy, assumed we were all idiots (or knew the Colregs), and in the given scenario would make a small course change to clear astern or ahead of the offending 'stand on' 'power gives way to sail' yacht. And everyone lived more or less happily to tell the tale.

Wightlink started it about 5 years ago: deciding that pleasure craft should give way to ferries regardless. This was extremely dangerous, as we were all used to them following colregs except in silly situations, and suddenly without warning they stopped trying (sic) to avoid us. This involved several forumites (myself included) in similar near miss scenarios where ferries cut straight across our bows.

Dangerous? yes: in my case, had I gone about to avoid the ferry, I would have placed myself across the course I expected him to take under colregs. As it was, when it became clear he was going for a 'near miss', I hove to and let him choose whether he wanted to pass ahead or astern, and ready to sail clear on whichever tack took me clear of him.

We do not know the full scenario of this report: it may be that they were close to Cowes and altering course to pass astern of the XBoat (which presumably was what the Xboat expected him to do from past encounters) the ferry would have placed himself at some other hazard. We dont know. Clearly though the XBoat skipper had not come across a ferry not willing to co-operate with him.

One can I suppose have a certain amount of sympathy with both skippers: the ferries have to cope with a great many idiots on the water doing unpredictable and sometimes downright dangerous things. The Yottie on the other hand may have had many 'friendly' encounters with IoW ferries where a bit of give and take ensured things went smoothly, and was taken unawares that on this occasion the ferry was demanding right of way over his sailing vessel.

Yes, given all the hooting that apparently went on, I think most of us would have realised the ferry was wanting us to get out of the way - but was the Yacht skipper even aware that it was him being hooted at and that he was expected to give way?
 
Perspective is a funny thing (especially with telephoto lenses), I wonder how much water there really was between the two ? Probably a lot more than it looks in the photo.


...... but I'd have still passed to stern of the ferry.
 
I am not taking anything personally dear boy, the whole episode has brightened my day. /forums/images/graemlins/smile.gif
 
Be interested to learn more if you can find it.

Having sailed for some 12yrs from the Hamble I have never had to alter course to avoid a Red Funnel. I have exercised the better part of valour with a wight link ferry when I thought he was unreasonably holding his course and I was sailing.

I have no probs if we are meant to give way to ferries but think this needs to be made clear to all. The Co Regs value is their clarity and if everyone conforms to them. The alternative is a simple set of 2 rules.

1. If you are the bigger vessel hold your course.

2. If you are the smaller vessel give way.

Rules only work if we all sail by the same ones.

Flamings comment makes more sense (X boat had just tacked) to me and agrees with all my experiences of Red Funnel Ferries
 
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