[Coastal Distress Options? DSC, AIS, EPIRB]

Maritime NZ website awaiting update currently says:

 

"RCCNZ usually receives alerts from distress beacons within minutes. However, depending on the type of beacon you're carrying, it can take two hours or longer for satellites to pinpoint your location."  http://www.maritimenz.govt.nz/Recreational-Boating/Communications-equipment/EPIRBs.asp#Why_is_the_response_not_always_immediate

 

This advice is very general worst case scenario and applies to land and sea.

 

The situation on sea is better because signals are picked up easier (no terrain and vegetation problems).

 

Maritime NZ are working on their website to update with more specific info. Here is what I was told a minute ago by a friendly chap in RCCNS:

 

1. Turn on EPIRB - 50 seconds to acquire satellite pinpoint fix IF you have a GPS enabled EPIRB.

2. 50 seconds to beam your fix and EPIRB number to geostationary satellite.

3. Info goes instantly to rescue centre in Australia and then to NZ

4. IF for any reason the geostationary satellite link doesn't work, THEN it might take (depending on orbit position) up to a couple of hours for orbiting satellites to pick up your signal.

 

So, since I have a GPS enabled EPIRB and I file trip reports, I think Channel 16 would be able to broadcast my pinpointed position within 10 minutes, probably after trying to raise me on the radio or cellphone.

 

So I'm going to rest easy with my neat little rescueME PLB1 (not much bigger than a matchbox).

[Coastal Distress Options? DSC, AIS, EPIRB]

I use dual or tri-watch depending on VHF in use and it's always on unless I need sleep.

 

I have a small EPIRB folded into my life-jacket. I trust that if I go overboard my GPS position would be known within minutes??

 

I also use paper charts for everywhere I go. It's a skill we should all have and maintain.

[Best Budget Plotter for smaller yachts!]

Thanks Matt

How would this be better than the app on Android

[Mid Atlantic rescue]

I don't have enough info to make a call on whether the boat was ok or what condition the crew may have been in or how good tie downs were inside for floorboards, equipment and crew and therefore risk of injury. Or whether they were pumping water etc etc.

 

I did think it was getting along at quite a clip even with the drougue, but as long as the drouge prevented broach and roll, good!

 

Problem could be cross seas later causing broach and roll from a different direction and I don't know what was forecast.

[What boat for Southern Chile?]

Hi matt do you have a link to what you have. By the way the crew website for mobile does not have a button to follow a thread

[Sea Shepherd]

I think Sea Shepherd do a great job. Sure they have moderated a little since the early days, but no one can argue with the direct positive effect they have on the front line marine conservation. I've had the pleasure of having been on board a few of their ships and as a whole they seem to be very professional and organised.

Let's hope so. When I saw the first few episodes of Whale Wars (the HBO? doco on them) I was actually VERY surprised they hadn't killed any of their own crew!!!  Check out the launching under way of their rib.

 

Don't get me wrong, they are doing a great job.

 

But Whale Wars showed Watson as a liar and manipulator. First mate Peter Brown wouldn't know one end of a rope from another. Second mate Peter Hammarstedt was a creepy acolyte of Watson who knew how to play to Watson's god complex. The management style was like nothing I'd ever seen. A suggestion, not an order, was made by Watson from within his office and it was implemented organically and piecemeal like an ant-colony at work. Have you ever seen a group of ants tugging on something and eventually getting it going in the right direction?

 

They had no serious drills, no maintenance inspections and their culture on board was to blame other people for errors which were the clear result of NO planning. The "doctor" in the first episode appeared to have no proper equipment and was preparing to treat hypothermia with hot drinks, blankets and a bar radiator - ie how to kill a victim of hypothermia!!!

 

Let's hope things have improved because they were putting their own and the lives of volunteers in serious danger.

[Sea Shepherd]

Having read the last Professional Skipper on the navy/wet bus ticket accusation, I'm siding with the Navy. Rule of Law and Law of the Sea is fundamental to a small nation like NZ.

 

Hey Matt, is there an option to automatically subscribe to a post I've posted on. It wastes time having to click on 'more reply options'.

[Ports Expansion]

Putting my economist hat on, gotta say that the trickle down trick of "so and so many thousand jobs created" is as old as the hills and usually relies on some very dodgy stats. So I'm very wary of the claim by Rehabilited (whoever he or she is) that POA "adds more than 187,000 jobs to the Auckland economy." I also find it the mark of a crude analysis, not to put too fine a point on it, that Rehab dismisses any alternative to his/her views as communist (grey boiler suits from memory). I think Rehab loses on a reverse technicality of Godwin's Law.

 

But let's not forget the most telling argument as far as I'm concerned: I'm told that the Lenny and Penny (Hulse not Whiting) faction promised no change until the big report on the whole future of the ports had been released for discussion. The P and L faction won't be getting my vote.

[Ports Expansion]

Thanks for the Manapouri flashback!

Here's the old John Hanlon song, Damn the Dam. ('cept is was power for Comalco, not the people, but why quibble with the lyrics at so late a date).

[Ports Expansion]

Not Penny Whiting, Penny Hulse, deputy mayor. She was chairing the meeting in the video

[Ports Expansion]

I'll be there at the demo on Sunday!

 

These arseholes did this in secret and made the decision BEFORE the final report on the port's future is released and discussed.

 

Same bunch of arseholes run a system to let an "independent" Duty Commissioner decide in secret that 300 year old kauri tree and ancient rimu (including on the public road reserve) could be cut down after describing it as "vegetation". I was at sea for 8 days and missed that bit of fun but caught up with the brilliant reporting of Kane Glass - (watch the tame bureaucrat forced to admit that a "threshold" is his personal "judgement" and watch tame legal counsel of council forced to admit that Penny's attempt to silence David Taipari is flawed.

 

Sorry to stray from the topic but I see a pattern here and we should let Lenny and Penny know what we think. I'm all for progress but not for secret deals without democratic input.

[First yacht day dreams : Cavalier 32 or similar for offshore cruising]

Thanks Matt. Leaving aside the budget for a moment, what boats would be on a good short list of modern designs that ?would give equivalent safety and perhaps forgiveness for short-handed crew.

[First yacht day dreams : Cavalier 32 or similar for offshore cruising]

To take a slightly different tack and pick up on Matt's point about the increased options in vessels these days, are there any boats of more modern design and open transom that would do the trick?

[First yacht day dreams : Cavalier 32 or similar for offshore cruising]

I have to agree with erice.

 

Offshore is a quantum leap in terms of experience required, possible risk, Cat 1 standards for the boat (good liferaft alone adds big bucks, not to mention reliable self steering of more than one kind) and backups of backups for most of your systems. I also dreamt of long offshore voyages perhaps single-handed or with small crew. Having done a 32 day trip from Tahiti to Chile, I now would not do an extended voyage with fewer than four crew (for safe and not too tiring watch rotations).  This probably means a bigger boat. Have fun.