"Jeff" wrote in message
...
Capt. JG wrote:
I thought SF Bay was quite foggy. Am I wrong? Back when I was saying
I could do fine without radar in Maine I would also think, "Now if I
was someplace like SF Bay..."

You're right, but it's really not necessary for a couple of reasons.
First, if you have it, you have to monitor, which takes away from the
enjoyment of sailing.


This is a curious point in the rules. Since it says "if operational" then
the requirement to monitor only applies if you have it turned on. For
short trips in clear weather, I generally leave the display stashed down
below. For longer trips, I will mount it, but whether its Off, on
Standby, or Active is determined by circumstance. When I've run this by
CG "rules experts" I've always got the same answer (which is curiously the
same as the answer to other "gray area" questions I've raised): "Your
logic sounds reasonable, but remember, if there is an accident you will
have to convince the court that you did everything in your power to
prevent it."

I've long been a fan of radar and feel its required to cruise Maine, and
useful in Massachusetts. One problem now is that while in the "old days"
(before low cost radar and loran/gps) the only fools out in the pea soup
were being ultra cautious, tooting horns, going slow etc, nowadays every
rich bozo thinks he can run his sportfish at 30 knots because the radar
and GPS will keep him safe. Almost every year I've had a close call, the
worst case happening a mile off of Cape Elizabeth. If you sail in fog,
radar is needed now for defense.


Yup... it's sort of a gotcha, like many things.


--
"j" ganz @@
www.sailnow.com