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Weird Compass


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27 minutes ago, Black Panther said:

Boat's location on the globe or conpass location on the boat?

 

Saw,something similar sailing through Iron Bottom Sound.

Boats location. Was like this for about 1nm...

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IT, you sure you weren't trying to navigate the current government policy on the Auckland Harbour bike bridge, housing supply, RMA reforms, climate change or security of energy supply? I know, you were trying to navigate how to get a resource consent for a small shed in an empty paddock? 

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That’s v weird. Did you notice if any other compasses on board behaved the same way?

Could only have been caused by moving through a spurious (but strong) EM field - any undersea cables in the area? Where was it?

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I did my military service in the Swedish navy. Among other things I was involved in 'de-gaussing' ships. What you do is kind of similar to erasing a tape (remember those?) but on a much larger scale: You move the ship through a strong magnetic field that is switched back and forth. The magnetic compass went berserk. It not only rotated like wild, it also stood on its end and flipped from side to side.

 

/Martin

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As W says there’s a (former?) de-gaussing point at SW end of Tiri Chl between the two yellow buoys. Not sure if it’s still used and I’ve never seen any military ships in there. I sail between them every other weekend and never noticed anything.

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27 minutes ago, Fogg said:

As W says there’s a (former?) de-gaussing point at SW end of Tiri Chl between the two yellow buoys. Not sure if it’s still used and I’ve never seen any military ships in there. I sail between them every other weekend and never noticed anything.

It's disconnected, and the old cables to them stolen/removed iirc.

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2 hours ago, eruptn said:

Curious thought, what would happen if there was a submarine under you?

That might do it. MAD (magnetic anomaly detection) is a thing for detecting subs but you need to be pretty close to see a significant change eg a few 100m. But if it was passing under you in shallow water it might do it especially if it had a problem with some of its stealth equipment which was failing to reduce its natural magnetic signature. Don’t ask me how I know this.

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On 11/08/2021 at 2:35 PM, Fogg said:

That’s v weird. Did you notice if any other compasses on board behaved the same way?

Could only have been caused by moving through a spurious (but strong) EM field - any undersea cables in the area? Where was it?

A sub is unlikely, this was in the inside the reef passage around Viti Levu, NW side, near Nanuyakoto I. It's only about 20-30m deep..

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Off Plymouth in the English Channel, we always use to loose our GPS signal. In the general vicinity of a military exercise area.

There was one incident, after a particularly boozy few days in a waterfront pub near the Hoe, sitting out a storm, we were slowing sailing along off Plymouth Sound, feeling a bit worse for wear, when a fighter jet lined us up. The thing was just above the waves, coming straight at us. I could see straight into the turbines on both sides of the cockpit.

We were sitting on deck having a yarn, my other crew with their backs to the jet fighter. I stopped talking mid sentence, and my jaw dropped open. My crew were looking at me like I was weird or something. Then this jet peels off to pass us just to stern at mast height, and the roar of its engines deafening us...

It would appear that in the firing range area, they like to use cruising yachts as natural moving targets...

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Yes I’ve been ‘used’ by Coastguard chopper for winchman practise in the Solent. And ‘played with’ by a Spanish frigate in a joint exercise off Lulwirth firing range. They used us as a turning point for high speed turns - was a calm day so ok but pretty spectacular watching a 10000s ton navy ship turning around you at ~30kts.

We’ll probably never solve the mystery if IT’s compass.

But we should be able to solve the even bigger question of why IT was “browsing FB the other night…”. WTF? I thought most grown men had left FB years ago???!!!

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