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Re: Vestas Wind Grounding Report
From: Stephen N.G. Davies
Date: 2015 Mar 12, 10:24 +0800
From: Stephen N.G. Davies
Date: 2015 Mar 12, 10:24 +0800
Actually it is a huge ‘rock' - the shoal ground (with four substantial islets, innumerable above surface rocks and even trees!) the Vestas Wind found extends roughly N/S for c.26 miles and ALL of it is awash, drying or with depths <2m. This shows up on the Navionics chart package even at a scale of 1:1,500,000, which suggests that whatever zoom the navigator/skipper duo were operating at, it was either smaller than that - for navigational planning utterly irresponsible - or the C-Map system is startlingly different to many ENCs at small scales.
Stephen D
Dr Stephen Davies
HK Institute for the Humanities and Social Sciences,
G08 May Hall
University of Hong Kong
Office: (852) 39175034
Mobile: (852) 66833754
On 12 Mar, 2015, at 9:41 am, Tom Sult <NoReply_TomSult@fer3.com> wrote:Now the conversation will turn to how celestial navigation would've saved the day. Given that on that size boat at those speeds in those conditions a 2 mile fix would've been excellent it wouldn't have changed a thing. The only thing that would've changed a thing was knowing the Scholl was there. On some level this is one of those interesting six Sigma events. It's a really big ocean and a really tiny rock. I suppose one could argue that if doing celestial navigation one would've had paper charts and perhaps it would've been more obvious on paper then on electronics. Properly used electronics are clearly superior. The problem is they have to be used properly. One does not need to see the whole ocean. One needs to see a few hours ahead of your boat. That would've given a zoom level that would have easily showed the hazard. At 15 Knots speed a very small zoom will suffice.
Tom Sult, MDAuthor: JUST BE WELLjustbewell.infoPlease find attached the complete report about the Vestas Winds grounding during the Volvo Ocean Race.
The sections on navigation make for interesting reading.
JMcD
Attached File:
(m36616_team-vestas-wind-inqu.pdf: Open and save or View online)