On Sun, 21 Aug 2011 12:02:19 -0400, wrote:

On Sat, 20 Aug 2011 09:46:39 -0700, wrote:

On Sat, 20 Aug 2011 08:44:39 -0400, wrote:

On Tue, 16 Aug 2011 21:04:15 -0700, wrote:

On Tue, 16 Aug 2011 19:00:06 -0400, BAR wrote:

In article ,
says...

I suspect this sailboat captain is rethinking who has the "Right of Way".

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_tUoUxzt9sI

The bigger you are the more right of way you have. Doesn't matter if you
are on the highway or on the water.

According to the regulation I've read, this is incorrect a lot of the
time.

Read this, "The bigger you are, the more likely you are to win in an
altercation."

The sailboat loses. End of story. No admiralty court is going to fault
the supertanker captain. Even with a proper lookout, there is no way
in hell they could have seen the sailboat dart in from of them. Even
if they could have, there is no way they could have stopped.

Boats don't have brakes. You have to work around that.

I never said otherwise. However, the statement that bigger you are
gives you "more right of way" is wrong. There is no such language in
any of the rules, inland or international.

This is what Tim posted as a counter example, and I've included my
comments:

Who had the right of way here?

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bkqKpnU8sCE

The boat from which the vid was taken, obviously. However, it had
nothing to do with the size of either boat. I would assign 90% blame
to the sailboat and 10% to the larger boat. It was a crossing
situation, but the bigger boat didn't attempt (as far as can be seen
or heard) to either take evasive action or sound an alarm... five or
more beeps I believe.

or how about here?

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=m4qwq...eature=related

You gotta remember that the larger the vessel, the slower the response
time.

In the case of the second vid, my reading of the rules are that it was
a crossing situation, so the boat being hit was probably "right" but
should have tried to avoid the collision. And, the boat that was
taking the vid should have avoided the situation. I would assign 60%
fault to the boat from which the vid was taken and 40% to the boat
that was hit.

I'm sure there is precedence that the court would look at also.

Your analysis is ridiculous. This was in NO way a crossing situation.
This was simply a head-on. Apparently, you have never piloted
anything larger than a runabout. A captain of a large vessel, even
with proper lookout, can't see what is under the bow. This sailboat
was, probably for 100 yards or more under the bow of the larger
vessel. This is so simple, Rule 2 covers the whole idiotic happening.

This is a lot like driving down the road in a tractor trailer and some
idiot decides to dive into a driveway on your right. Even if you
manage to T-bone them instead of dead-centering their grille, it is a
head-on, and if you were reasonably and lawfully operating your
vehicle, you bear no responsibility in the accident.

BTW, your five "beeps" are only exchanged in accordance with Rule 34,
which allows only "authorized" or "required" maneuvers, which this was
not.

By the way, the five beeps are really 5 short and rapid blasts of a
whistle. Sounds trivial, but if you ever sit for a captains license,
that is enough to miss a few questions. The USCG must think it is
important.

You sound like the ridiculous one. Did you even look at the second
vid?

Here are the three vids:

1) http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_tUoUxzt9sI

I heard three horn sounds from what appears to be the tanker. Five is
the minimum. However, it's possible there were five.

The sailboat is clearly approaching 100% at fault.

2) http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bkqKpnU8sCE

This is for sure a crossing situation. Again, the sailboat is clearly
mostly at fault. However, I didn't see any evasive change in course
from the ferry or any sound signals. The sailboat was clearly visible
for quite a while. Some blame would go to both.

3) http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=m4qwq...eature=related

I think this is a crossing situation also, but even if it's a head on,
both vessels need to act. Neither did. Both were visible to the other.
No sound signals, no heading changes. Both have fault.