Yachting Monthly - April 2016

LETTERS

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8 http://www.yachtingmonthly.com APRIL 2016

2

5

Killala

Bartragh I.

Bartragh

Pool Moy Bar

Killala Bar

Killala Bar on the left, Moy Bar on the right.

Nigel’s anchorage would have been in Bartragh

Pool, halfway up the channel to Killala pier

CHART: MAxine HeATH

Crossing the right bar

Warm congratulations to Nigel Calder for

his excellent and vivid piece The wrong way

around Ireland (Feb 16) about sailing the

west coast of Ireland. He chose some unusual

and out-of-the-way places to drop his hook

• I might mention Doonbeg, Paradise and
  Barrow Harbour. There’s a touch of class
  about that. His caution about the limitations
  of chartplotters in many places – showing
  the boat travelling over land – is spot on, and
  a salutary reminder of the need to use all
  available means on this challenging coast.
  One small correction, for safety’s sake:
  he refers to crossing the Moy Bar to get into
  Killala, but I fear he mixed his bars. While
  Killala does have a shallow bar, with three
  good sets of leading marks as Nigel describes,
  the bar at the entrance to the River Moy, two
  miles away, is more exposed and among the
  most difficult river entrances in Ireland. With
  mobile sandbanks and no leading marks, it’s a
  white-knuckle job. We did it in a Sigma 33 in
  1994, and Michael Brogan of the Irish Cruising
  Club (ICC) took his Galway hooker MacDuach
  in last year. He wrote: ‘I would not recommend
  doing it without a local pilot’ – and this from
  a man who has sailed the Northwest and
  Northeast Passages! I put pilotage details for
  the Moy into the ICC Sailing Directions in 2001,
  and took them out again in 2006.
  Norman Kean

Regulate pot buoys

The RNLI has, at great expense and risk,

rescued 1,197 people in the last two years

because of fouled propellers, so why is it

acceptable that pot buoys have not been

regulated? Such hunting methods used on

land would be banned as a public danger.

Anyone who has dodged pot buoys from

pop bottles to beer barrels and their long

floating pick-up lines, during the day or night,

must wonder why this antiquated method of

fishing is allowed to continue.

Pot buoys should be at least the size and

reflective colour of traffic cones, lit with a

strobe light, set away from sailing routes

and their position registered on a dedicated

website. Their lines should not float and

the owner’s registration number should be

displayed clearly so that any deviation from

the requirements allows the full cost of rescue

and repair to be recovered.

Tony Barlow

PHOTO: AlAMy

Pot buoys should be

more conspicuous, and

their positions logged,

writes Tony Barlow

PHOTO: COlin WORk

Using cheap Christmas lights

and an LED cluster on the

boom end, this anchored boat

was much easier to see

We need more common

sense on Colregs

Small-craft lights have always concerned

me but a certain amount of common sense

should be applied. For example, in Chichester

harbour a boat should be readily pinpointed

by its anchor light, but if you are alone at the

top of a creek in the middle of winter then it

might not be so necessary.

I like the idea of using Christmas lights.

With the introduction of LEDs, why not

have the forestay and backstay illuminated?

Anything that can make you more obvious to

other vessels should be welcomed.

I also think that the existing rules on

navigation lights should be looked into. In my

opinion, they should be larger and brighter

than they currently are.

Richard Smith

We don’t need to

change the Colregs

As a seagoing Master Mariner and a keen

yachtsman, I follow many of the initiatives

that YM undertakes with interest. When it

comes to Rule of the Road I feel that greater

analysis would be beneficial. In your recent

article Why anchor lights are inadequate (Feb

16) lies an interesting example.

I suggest that you look at Rule 30 the other

way around. The aim of the rule is to make

the vessel as visible as possible with a series

of opt-out clauses as vessel length reduces,

to assist with the practicality of compliance.

Throughout the rules two critical words

appear: ‘may’ and ‘shall’, so altering rule

30 is not required. The obligation is on the

skipper to make sure his vessel is adequately

lit but without being overly prescriptive. I do,

though, wholeheartedly agree that an anchor

light 18m up is not helpful. The option to

adjust sits with the skipper, but as is so often

the case people take the easiest option.

Richard Davies

Always brief a co-skipper

Regarding your Question of Seamanship (Jan

16), if I was the skipper swimming in the Bay of

Biscay watching the yacht sailing away under

spinnaker in roughening conditions, I might

wish I had appointed someone to take control

in my absence. I would certainly wish I had

told them to press the MOB button in order for

them to have any chance of finding me once

the boat was under control!

Alexander Hoare

Never drag again

How to anchor like an expert (Jan 16) seemed

to miss the most effective holding in strong

winds, which is to attach a second anchor to

the chain of the first.

My second anchors, a 10kg fisherman and a

15kg Rocna, both have 5m of chain and 60m

rope, and the type of ground dictates which

I use. The point of attachment depends on

depth, so let’s assume 15m. Drop 30m of main

anchor, attach the end of the chain on the

second anchor to the chain of the main anchor,

using a shackle or Dyneema, and let out

another 20m. The 60m of rope means you can

retrieve the second anchor if the attachment

fails. I have never dragged in high winds in the

West Indies, Bahamas and all around the Med.

Peter Tabori