Peter Wiley wrote:

..... My point is that if you *insist* that ships must travel
sufficiently slowly to have the ability to take evasive action/stop on
a visual sighting, you are in effect stating that commercial traffic
must cease whenever visibility is so poor as to be less than the
distance needed to stop/manoeuvre.

Which is going to happen more often than you think. For example, night time... or
taking a big tow of barges around a bend in the ICW or the Mississippi...

Furthermore, this has been going on for a *very* long time, probably all the way
back to Hanseatic cogs....



The guy in the kayak cannot expect ships to slow beyond the point where they
lose the ability to steer. I guess that for most big ships that this is
about 4-5 kts????

Even at 4-5 knots if you're in fog with 50m visibility there's no hope
of manoeuvering fast enough to miss an idiot in a kayak. 50m is half of
a ship length for my icebreaker.

And attempting to maneuver might suck the idiot into the prop, too. Best chance
would probably be to ring up 'All Stop' and coast over him, with luck he could
surf clear on the bow wave....



In reality, I know that they will exceed this speed.
When I cross the TSS in fog, I expect that most ships will be doing about 12
kts, and that some will be doing 18 kts. I also expect/know that some of
them won't be sounding their fog horns.

No excuse for that IMHO.



The kayak is taking a chance when he crosses the TSS. However, that does
not mean that the ships in the TSS should carry on as if there was no risk.

They don't. They monitor their radars and radios. It's small vessels
with no radio, no radar and poor/no reflectivity that are at risk - AND
THEY HAVE AN OBLIGATION NOT TO IMPEDE THE COMMERCIAL VESSEL. In my
opinion the commercial vessel should keep a lookout as required and
proceed as if other vessels were also obeying the Colregs.

Right. And this is the point that Rick seems to be overlooking. The kayaker is
bound to 1- not impede commercial traffic and 2- not create a hazardous condition
and by playing around in shipping lanes in fog, he is doing both. Too bad he can't
get run over twice!


If you wish to do 25 kts through the Antartic, in fog, then I have no
objection.

Unfortunately, 14 kts is the best we can do :-( Besides when the fog's
really thick it's usually a blizzard and you can't see anything so we
park in a convenient icefloe. Radar is good, but hitting a bergy bit is
still possible. We cut out hull plate the size of a VW beetle at both
the last 2 drydocks due to such an impact. A kayak (or Benetau)
wouldn't even scratch the paint.

But a certain C&C 32 might leave an ugly smear.....

Fresh Breezes- Doug King