Greetings everyone - interested about workload caused by collision avoidance

[pierrevan]

Thank you John for this feed back. I note your reminder about crossing the shipping lane at right angle and possibly not under sails.

[Tony Taylor]

I agree with everything said so far, but additionally there is a distinct lack of common sense and self preservation among the sailing community.
In 1967, as a first trip eng. apprentice, I witnessed the same behaviour as Brian, and even worse, while running up to Fawley, during Cowes week.
A small boat with a small outboard containing two adults and two small children, six years old at best, ran across our bow, swung down the port side, came about and was running parallel with the midships within a few yards, all waving and laughing; That was until the old man walked out on the bridge wing with a megaphone and told the idiot who was driving what to do in good Anglo Saxon.
They swung away looking a bit taken aback and disappeared into the crowd.
Not one of them had life jackets.

[pierrevan]

To narrow the scope of the information I try to specifcally get, circumstances I am focused on is poor visibility, either because of havy rains or due to fog.
In places like the English channel those conditions would typically be seen a 1/20th of the time (+/-).

In those conditions (less than 300ft visibility often) a good lookout will be of little help against a container ship coming at 20 kts.

Now here comes the electronics, sailing vessels are nowadays often equiped with AIS.

You either have the cheaper/basic version of it, which is a receiver only.

It allows for a sailing vessel to "see" the boats equipped with a AIS transponder.

On the other hand, the more expensive version allows to receive and emit (transponder), thus providing information about heading, speed, name of vessel etc. (what merchant vessels are nowadays used to).

Question was to know whether it was an obvious added value for sailing vessels to have the more sofisticated version, thus the AIS with transponder.

Apparently at least for the peace of mind of bridge officers reply is yes, in the thick fog you would see smaller crafts in your vicinity. Probably better than with the radar.

[Captain Kong]

In was on a VLCC, 256,000 dwt. in 1978, homeward bound from the Gulf via the Cape.
Our Radars packed in, Nothing. We had the same Navigation equipment as Captain Cook,
just a sextant and two eyes.
We were bound for Rotterdam and on entering the Channel the fog came down.with a fore deck nearly 1,000 feet in lengrth we could not see the focsle head.We used dead reckoning and proceeding at slow speed.
Rather scary as we approached the Calais- Dover route and had ferries flashing past. I had a cigarette in both hands.
as well as all the traffic we had a 90 foot draft.
But we eventually got to the Pilot area as the fog cleared and we arrived safely.
I dont think any yachts were around, I certainly didnt see any in the fog.

Brian

[John Arton]

Regarding the A.I.S question, the yacht should ask themselves how much do they value their cost of their yacht and their lives against the extra cost of fitting the transponder A.I.S model.
Modern radars are much better at picking up smaller targets these days but are still not infallible. Having an X band and a S band radar fitted will, if tuning and gain settings are monitored and adjusted correctly will certainly improve target recognition but just having a radar reflector fitted is no guarantee of you being detected by an approaching vessel as it has been shown that fog and rain can affect the performance of said reflectors.
The other question to ask yourself as a yacht owner is, if fog is predicted to occur during the passage that takes in busy shipping lanes,why set sail in the first place? Stay safely moored in port and enjoy another G & T or a glass of vino.
Be a prudent sailor/yachtsman, not the idiot many of us encountered over the years.
Brian's experience with both radars packing in is very rare these days as vessels that are required to have taken sets will be fitted with inter switching units so should the transhiever for one unit pack in then the display for that unit can be slaved to the working transceiver. Modern radars use flat screen displays and it's not uncommon to carry a spare and will be plug and play AKA your home computer. Carrying a spare means you will still be in class should one display fail and similar with the inter switching unit, one transceiver failing means you still have two operational radar displays.
Rgds
J.A.
Rgds
J.A.

[pierrevan]

Again, thank you for feed back.

[Des Taff Jenkins]

I was on a cargo ship in 52 full of iron ore, we hit the channel and thick fog came down, the skipper went to dead slow and blowing the horn and ringing the forecastle bell, then we heard this deep bellow of a siren, no idea from which direction in the fog, all of a sudden the Queen Mary rushed passed, must have been doing 25 knots, twin radar turning, not a pretty sight; and god help any yachtsman in the way.
Des

[happy daze john in oz]

Des, fog in the channel, oh what joy.
In a similar situation on the Pretoria outward bound.
No QM but there were many a cargo ship horn blaring that would just suddenly appear.

Laundry service kept very busy with underwear.

[Colin Wood]

NO, never ely on radar.
Master and I went on board an American ship in Saigon as she had unusual cargo gear. Talking to 3rd. mate who insisted on showing us the bridge which was very modern and had latest nav gear. Looking at the latest radar with automatic collision notification and he told us, "last voyage from Honolulu to LA had fog all the way and saw nothing and then suddenly Catalina came out of the murk dead ahead. That goddam radar had not been working all that time".
I was on one ship as 2nd Mate Mate and Master where we had no radar. One was started to be installed in Hong Kong when they realised if it was fitted, we had to fit a new generator, so it went ashore.

[Captain Kong]

The Radar on the Cunard Liner FRANCONIA when I was on her in 1956 was 6 inches in diameter, and the screen was attached to the wheelhouse window, Must have been one of the earliest war time RADARS.
It came in handy when we came across the Andria Doria incident off the Nantucket Shoals.

Whenever I had a n Apprentice on watch with me I always told them ,
Never ever trust anyone outside the Bridge Windpw.