Right of way

[Bill Roosa]

I beleive you are using "may" in a

way that the reg enforcers would not agree with. "May" means it is my choice to help others identify my situation when 'I' feel it is necessary.The channel I'm referring to is not 300' wide, it is only about 25' wide, 7'deep with shoals to 2.5' on both sides. 25' is well within the reach of a fishing cast. 25' leaves me some room to maneuver but not much. It is pretty obvious to most casual observers that I'm a sailboat and have draft issues. I personally don't think I need to run the cylinder to identify myself during daylight.And yes I have the 3 red and the 2 reds for "vessels aground" and the balls and cones too. Not that more than 1% of the boating population would know what they mean.With all that said, what would you do in a 25'x7' channel with a 5' draft vessel? Running aground will not solve the problem and neither will crashing into the other boats. So if they are dumb enough to leave their lines in the water while I maneuver to miss them and they get snagged in my line cutters I really don't loose much sleep over it. I'm not going to endanger my boat so they can go fishing. I have tried to be nice about this and most will pull their lines. This is addressed to those few who insist that they are "engaged in fishing" and have the right of way. Most will agree that they are indeed engaged in fishing but that is not what the regs mean when they say "engaged in fishing". These "persons" are just a*&##%s h%(#$s.

 

[Herb Parsons]

Not Me

Bill,It's not MY use of the word, that's what the colregs say. It's a direct quote.The interpretation (and this is what I got in class, and it showed up on tests) is that a vessel constricted in manuverability does not have to display the signals, but if they don't then they are not given special consideration as the stand-on vessel.The 18di rule is the part that states other vessels cannot impede IF the vessel constrained are showing lights. In other words, you don't have to show the lights, but you get no extra priviledge as stand-on vessel if you don't.You are right though, in most of your other assertions. The boat's fishing are not "engaged in fishing", unless they have nets out (that's defined in the regs), and MARKED.I too, would, if the fishermen refused to leave, just keep on going through their lines. I wouldn't take pleasure in it, and if they questioned me, I'd shrug it off and tell them they didn't give me much choice.My point in pointing out the error though was that most folks simply do not understand the regs.