JimH wrote:

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No. Why should I?

According to the testimony Chuck posted the SOLAS standard flares did no
better than the good old USCG ones in a foggy situation when a passing boat
was *nearby*.

Not so. The PGID (poor guy in distress) noticed a dramatic difference
in the amount of
light produced by the SOLAS flares. It is true that neither flare
attracted the commercial fish boat's attention, but not true that there
was no difference in performance.


I responded to a CG relayed distress call, well after dark, a couple of
years ago in Shilshole Bay. Some guy was out in a small boat, and (as
we learned later) he had run out of gas and drifted onto the mudbanks
outside the marked channel. He didn't have a cell phone, didn't have a
VHF, but did happen to have some cheapie flares. He lit up some of his
flares and began waving and hollering at boats passing nearby. Nobody
noticed him. Somebody having dinner in a restaurant on shore saw the
light and called the police, and the police called the USCG.

Here's a perfect example of a guy who was in trouble very close to
shore but who had a difficult time trying to attract attention with his
sputtering little dimbulb flares. The problem was the backlighting from
the restaurants, etc on shore. I arrived on scene just ahead of the
fireboat. I could see the flare from about 40-50 feet away- period, and
I couldn't get any closer because I would also be aground if I
proceeded. I had to tell the crew on the fireboat where to look to see
the flare, and they were maybe 100 feet astern of me. (They launched an
inflatable to deal with the shallow depths). The PGID was easier to
spot from shore because his little toy flare was against a dark
background. The only chance he might have ever had to be seen from the
water in an environment with any shoreside development (seen by a
rescue vessel rather than a helpless person on the beach) would have
been to use one heck of a bright flare.