Mine bought after Katrina. 42"
HP DesignJet 800 Printer series | HP® Customer Support
There are smaller units now.
Jim...
Navigation: Old School vs New School
- Thread starter Phil Herring
- Start date
HP DesignJet 800 Printer series | HP® Customer Support
There are smaller units now.
Jim...
You're only off in that I didn't blame the accident on old school vs new school. Trying to figure out what happened is fun but futile. In the end it's complacency, nearly every time.So, forgive if I’m off here. I don’t see how this incident says anything about plotters or other e-navigation aids. The schooner is out of the clearly-marked channel, on the wrong side of “RRT.” How could the skipper miss that the boat was making way for the wrong side of the nun? Was he trying to shoot the gap? The yawl boat could have been deployed to correct the course if due to drift. At this point in full visibility of the ATONs, what more could a chartplotter have done except to “guide” the boat through an unmarked “pass?” Isn’t that where “local knowledge” is supposed to come into play?
I've been saying for years that despite screens showing sailboats still hitting rocks - in real time - groundings haven't slowed down.
Your tools, your choice. I don't use radar but many do.
It's always the same, asleep at the wheel, that gets you. Today though, there are few excuses for it and little chance that you will hide the incident.
Here's a couple others I pulled off FB while looking at this one: I'll wager screens onboard showed these boats hitting the rocks in real time.
Tom, you bring back memories. We cruised Maine back in the mid 80's when we had Loran C for our best nav locator. And the display was down below. The readout was in TDs, which one then needed to plot on the appropriate chart. I can remember specific incidents when I looked from the helm and thought "...hmmm I didn't expect to see an islet or ledge dead ahead....". As you say, asleep at the helm.You're only off in that I didn't blame the accident on old school vs new school. Trying to figure out what happened is fun but futile. In the end it's complacency, nearly every time.
I've been saying for years that despite screens showing sailboats still hitting rocks - in real time - groundings haven't slowed down.
Your tools, your choice. I don't use radar but many do.
It's always the same, asleep at the wheel, that gets you. Today though, there are few excuses for it and little chance that you will hide the incident.
Here's a couple others I pulled off FB while looking at this one: I'll wager screens onboard showed these boats hitting the rocks in real time.
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jssailem
SBO Weather and Forecasting Forum Jim & John
- Oct 22, 2014
- 23,525
Thank you @TomY for sharing your insight. Especially your continued review of the situation and conjecture from experience what may have happened.
This type of post incident discussion is wha that happened with skippers for years. There just has not been as many observations as there are now. I feel for the skipper. I can surmise he was using his experience in the waters to guide his actions. It is easy to be a foot off from your normal standing position on your boat and look out to confirm your bearing and be a degree or two off in your sighting. Then you add a tidal current and a lack of breeze and before you know it the pleasant day cruise is changed.
As you say in days gone by it would have been a laugh and "What the hell happened to ya Captain" among sailors at the pub. Now it is Public awareness around the world. And opinions around the world. "Never would have happened to me. I got state of the art electronics" condemnations.
I like the pub days. Being a certified vessel now they will be out of the water and CG inspected, again. Oh boy... Tough to live down such sailing experiences with the advent of phone cameras and Facebook posts.
This type of post incident discussion is wha that happened with skippers for years. There just has not been as many observations as there are now. I feel for the skipper. I can surmise he was using his experience in the waters to guide his actions. It is easy to be a foot off from your normal standing position on your boat and look out to confirm your bearing and be a degree or two off in your sighting. Then you add a tidal current and a lack of breeze and before you know it the pleasant day cruise is changed.
As you say in days gone by it would have been a laugh and "What the hell happened to ya Captain" among sailors at the pub. Now it is Public awareness around the world. And opinions around the world. "Never would have happened to me. I got state of the art electronics" condemnations.
I like the pub days. Being a certified vessel now they will be out of the water and CG inspected, again. Oh boy... Tough to live down such sailing experiences with the advent of phone cameras and Facebook posts.
That's what I do. I have the paper charts but they're pretty old. I update my electronic charts often, they're supposed to be current as of the day you download them. And free for US waters.
I've learned quite a bit seeing these groundings on our coast and living near several boatyards that repair these victims. Probably first is that most happen in familiar waters, in broad daylight and good weather. This is good for someone like me who has had some groundings over decades to be extra vigilant around 'home'.
Next, most of these groundings never get reported. That's largely due to the fact that while photos like I posted look dire, most boats float off undamaged. Gives you a sense of how many groundings actually may take place.
Captains, pro and am, don't talk about the incidents if they don't have to. Boat yards don't either because they're aware of this. Silly pride.
I saw that schooner yesterday in a nearby harbor while doing some biking. It's tied to it's docks and all spiffed up and will load up with the next week of 'schooner dudes' (local slang), today.
Here is the link to all the Charts used in your Electronic Chart plotters.
NOAA Nautical Chart Catalog
As I was reading some of the NOAA info on Charts, I noticed a repeated "warning" about Commercial Vessels chart use.
"Charts obtained from NOAA's Nautical Chart Catalog are for general use only and do not comply with U.S. Coast Guard carriage requirements for commercial vessels. Certified NOAA paper nautical charts, which do meet carriage requirements can be obtained from a NOAA certified chart agent." [Emphasis added by me]
Although I am not going to explore USCG requirements, I am going to speculate why commercial vessels have to have certified charts aboard [as do USNavy vessels].
"Manual Graphical Plotting"
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If you obtain the PDF format versions, you can use your favorite PDF viewer and view your favorite or critical areas of navigation.
If you have a Printer that is "Scalable" you can make a "non certified" paper copy.
I do have such a printer for full scale [ 1/32th inch accurate] prints.
____
At a minimum, your simple printer, can print the Booklet
NOAA Raster Chart Products
8.5x11 book.
Jim...
PS: NOAA just released its newest chart symbol guide [May 2019]
NOAA releases new edition of nautical chart symbol guide
Can you read your newest chart plotter symbols?
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This thread might want some updating now that "official" printed charts are being (or already have been) phased out. I will keep all of my old and older charts. As another old friend always sez: "the rocks have not changed"...
While loving our modern radar/plotter, I admit to being partial to the 'official' NOAA chart books, which we discovered when starting out cruising our Ranger 20 sailboat in 1980.
While loving our modern radar/plotter, I admit to being partial to the 'official' NOAA chart books, which we discovered when starting out cruising our Ranger 20 sailboat in 1980.
Short answer - I like paper charts for planning. Chart plotter for sailing.This thread might want some updating now that "official" printed charts are being (or already have been) phased out. I will keep all of my old and older charts. As another old friend always sez: "the rocks have not changed"...
While loving our modern radar/plotter, I admit to being partial to the 'official' NOAA chart books, which we discovered when starting out cruising our Ranger 20 sailboat in 1980.
Long answer:
So 6 years ago when this thread started, I'd never used a chart plotter - only multiple ways of using different ways of piloting and route planning based off paper charts. Since then, I've done quite a bit of sailing with different systems. I did my two Atlantic crossings using paper charts, Navionics, Garmin, C-maps and OpenCPN. Additionally I had several crew that had their own navigation software, from Expedition to some European programs that I don't recall their names.
I've just come back from a two month sailing trip to Nova Scotia on a yacht running the latest B&G software and paper charts. We picked up print on demand paper charts in Halifax.
Maybe because I'm really an "old world sailor", but trip planning seems SO much easier using paper charts. By far the easiest way to do a route on a chart plotter was using OpenCPN. Like head and shoulders easier than any of the other software programs I've used, especially when it comes to reviewing the route and subsequent editing.
For great circle navigation, the easiest was the Garmin (I did not do this on the B&G). With the Garmin all I had to do was put in my start point and end point and it calculated the great circle route. The second easiest was using paper charts, but you need the great circle maps. I understand OpenCPN has a module to do this but I haven't delved into it yet.
As far as costs go, OpenCPN is by far the winner. The software is free, the North American charts are free, and charts for regions that are not free are very reasonably priced. I spent about $100 for all the charts I used compared to about $800 for Navionics (pre take over by Garmin) and about $1800 for the same chart sets for the Garmin. C-maps came with my boat so no idea of cost there. I have not purchased charts for B&G. I didn't buy paper charts that would have covered the same areas but that would have need really expensive.
The much touted route optimization routines using boat polars and wind forecasts for a cruising boat seem to be close to worthless. Really, just watch the weather and make sound decisions. Now if you're racing or running a high performance boat that would change my opinion.
dj
