....
Sitting at the nav station typing 500 word posts and looking at a
RADAR screen every 15 min violates COLREG RULE 5. Get out of the
office and sail your boat!

Yes but just about all vessels that go off shore are in violation of
rule 5 most of the time. As nearly as I can make out fishing vessels
never keep any watch at all, but even commercial carriers are pretty
bad about watch keeping at sea. The "good news" for small boat
operators is that it is unlikely that we will damage the vessel that
runs us down so if we don't keep a good watch we probably aren't
endangering anyone but ourselves. Still, I'm not totally in love
with Skip's watch keeping system. Leaving the RADAR on 24 miles is a
mistake. Most targets will not show at 24 miles and closer targets
may be lost in the clutter. Also intermittent targets will only be
evident if you watch the ppi closely for several scans. Good practice
when only one set is available is to watch the screen for several
scans at long range and then repeat at medium and then short range
periodically. It is also very important to make a careful visual
scan on a regular basis. In clear weather I've found that we almost
always make visual contact on small targets before we see them on
RADAR.

-- Tom.