It is amazing to watch them manouver a string of barges into a lock,
there is a lot of skill involved, but they do it very slowly and
carefully. Note that the tug is at the back of the string, so the
lookout on the bridge is likely to be 1/4 mile from the front of the
string of barges. If the boat is close enough to the front barge, it is
likely to be completely hidden from view of the bridge.

I have always been told not to expect to be seen in a small boat by
freighters, barges, and other large boats. I would think that would
apply double at night. A houseboat is not a small boat to me, but it is
small compared to a string of barges a 1/4 mile long. I am not sure how
many miles it takes to stop a string of barges, not to speak of the
issues of upstream vs. downstream travel. The Ohio river is very busy
in terms of recreation and commercial traffic.

When I see barges on the Ohio River at night, the tug has an extremely
powerful searchlight up top, so it should be visible from miles away,
unless there is fog. A houseboat probably just has normal navigation
lights, so not nearly as visible. If all the lights are on in the
houseboat, that makes the houseboat more visible, but probably kills the
vision of the skipper. So for the houseboat, there is no good answer on
the lights, other than to have your own powerful spotlight.

One other note is that human beings, even sober ones with good
intentions, are not at their best at 4 AM, so errors are more likely,
both on the part of the houseboat and the barge/tug.

richard



Oci-One Kanubi wrote:

Is this news?

Garrison Hilliard wrote:

By Ryan Clark
Enquirer staff writer

DAYTON, Ky. - All along the river here, where gawkers mixed with
passersby, everyone wanted to know what happened. Why did the boat go out
so early in the morning?


What difference does it make why they went out? What might matter is
the condition of the pilot (inebbriated? drugged up?)


Why couldn't they signal the oncoming barge?


Maybe they did.


Why couldn't the barge see the small houseboat?


Maybe it did.


The quiet marinas lining
Northern Kentucky were mobbed after a man was killed, another escaped and
two others are missing after a barge hit their 36-foot houseboat
overnight.

[snip]

"It's just so dangerous," he said. "... People need to know that there are
times when it's hard to see you out there."


It's *always* difficult for a large vessel to see a small one.

I don't live near one of those commercial arteries, but I am dam' sure
those barges (especially when they are rafted up) are pigs when it come
to emergency evasive maneuvers, and I am sure that if I put on the
river -- day *or* night -- I would regard it as *my* responsibility to
stay out of their way.

This pathetic article didn't give a word of description of the barge
itself, which might have helped in understanding how the incident
occured. I thought the job of the reporter was to give us answers, not
questions. *My* question is: why did he bother to turn in the article
before he gathered a description of the barge and interviewed the
survivor? Of *course* "everyone wanted to know what happened", and it
is the reporter's job to tell them!

Thanks for posting this, Garrison. I'm starting to take an interest in
the Ohio, Mississippi, and Missouri rivers, and what goes on on 'em. I
wish the reporter had actually reported something substantive.


-Richard, His Kanubic Travesty
--

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