BEYOND THE HORIZON

SAILING THOUGHTS

            John Vigor writes wise and beneficial epistles regarding sailing, regardless of the size of the vessel. 

ABANDON SHIP: John states that often people abandon their boat and simply float away. Sometime later the half-sunken hull is found but the survivors are not. Stick with the ship.

            LET GO: when all else fails, simply let go of everything, The boat knows how to respond to problems a lot better than the sailor. This lesson was learned the hard way after a multitude of capsizes with my first dinghy.

            BOAT TYPE: Too many people buy a boat without any idea how it will be used. Day sailors will buy a cruiser, Cruisers will buy a coastal cruiser, and everyone (yeah, me too) will purchase too many gadgets, gewgaws, and gear. I bought my first dinghy to teach myself how to sail, and it was well equipped with depth finders, GPS, wind indicators, anchors, chain, porta potty, etc. I sailed in a lake the size of an Olympic swimming pool now littered with my equipment after a subsequent capsize. Vigor says a Day Sail boat should have more cockpit than cabin, uncapsizable, lots of floatation, simple rig, and minimal gear. He is correct.

KNOTS: He suggests that all sailors need to know how to make 2 knots, 1 bend, and 2 hitches: figure 8 and bowline, anchor bend, Clove hitch, and rolling hitch. 

POV

            After two courses on the history of language and linguistics, it originally seemed that the concept of swearing came with the invention of golf; however, after extensive examination, experimentation, and experience, literary experts discovered that swearing evolved slowly, methodically, and (appropriately) near the water.

            God created fish for the evolutionary process of moving from simple one-cell entities to fish to land animals and, eventually, to humans, who ascertained that fish were good eating. The early species undertook to trap fish in shallows and, later, using baskets. This endeavor proved neither effective nor efficient. The origin of the prefrontal lobe allowed some Neanderthal to try a pole, hook, and bait methodology with better results. Fish, being smarter than the advanced ape-relative, moved to the middle of the waters that were unreachable with ye olde fish pole.

Perhaps it was Homo Erectus who created a raft or canoe to reach fish farther from shore. Rowing was arduous and tiring so came the origin of the sail. Sails required lines, lines required knots, and early man required intelligence that it did not have. Knotted lines, flapping sails, wind changes, swirling breezes, and the lack of wind led Homo Sapiens to expand the language necessary to express frustration, anger, rage, aggravation, exasperation, and infuriation. According to the oceanic philosophical eminence and erudite writer of things nautical, Bob Bitchin, “I love my boat, said no sailor, ever.” And thus, arose swearing. 

One cannot be around a dock, pier, or boat landing without soon hearing the siren song of a sailor cursing. The art of backing a trailer into water inspires profanity. Lines that break or knots coming undone will evoke a series of cursing rarely heard elsewhere. Wind alone warrants extensive vulgarities, oaths, crudities, expletives, and an explosion of verbiage of bad taste. Listen, ye lubbers, you now know the origin of swearing. 

INLAND WATERWAYS

The Supreme Court overturned the CHEVRON DEFERENCE, a concept existing since 1984 whereby when legal language is ambiguous, the appropriate Federal agency defines what is the appropriate action. This originally arose in the 1946 Administrative Procedures Act. Rules, regulations, mandates, and directives have been left to the agencies as a cornerstone of administrative law, according to Justice Elena Kagan.

In overthrowing the existing procedures, the Court argued that this allocation of responsibilities turns administrative agencies into lawmakers violating the Constitutional separation of powers. A myriad of cases have hit the courts.  Loper Bright fought the Magnuson-Stevens Act of 1976 which extended exclusive fishing zones to 200 miles. The National Marine Fisheries Services used the act to require certain fishing vessels to carry a Federal Monitor on board to ensure they were not overfishing. The cost of that person was given to the fishermen and could be as much as 20% of the earnings. 

The other side argued that laws are never clear and concise for every action and that the original intention of Congress requires someone to discern it. The courts simply cannot decide every little interpretation of legislative intent, especially many years after the fact. Worse, the Chevron Deference has been cited as law in over 18,000 cases.

In the end, the Supreme overthrew the Chevron Deference by 6-3. It was clearly the Conservatives vs the Liberals. Justice Kagan called the decision “judicial hubris”, and said the Court now becomes the decider of every single regulatory law, as if the courts did not enough on their plates. Critics said that the Conservative Justices are “aggressively reshaping the foundations of our government.”

Caterpillar sets 2026 as its deadline for a methanol-diesel fuel that will operate the CAT 3516E engine that will lower emission standards significantly. 

The California Air Resources Board (CARB) unanimously voted to require to require diesel particulate filters on all vessels even though no one had tested such a device, in fact, such a device is unavailable. Opposition to the mandate included ports and harbors, the fishing industry, the passenger ship businesses, yachting groups, marinas, and the Coast Guard. 

Don’t ya just love Do-Gooders!

GRAY FLEET

What is something that almost nobody knows about submarines?

The smell.

When nuclear submarines are at sea, they mostly remain submerged in a sealed atmosphere. Part of the atmosphere control system functions is to remove carbon dioxide (CO2) since a build-up of carbon dioxide can become fatal. To remove the carbon dioxide submarines, use a chemical called amine. When amine is cool it absorbs carbon dioxide and when hot will release it. So, the amine is cycled through a machine referred to as a CO2 Scrubber, which will alternately heat and cool the carbon dioxide and push the gas into the ocean, keeping the atmosphere breathable.

This is a very effective system, with the downside being the amine imparts a rather “unique” smell into the atmosphere. Which ultimately permeates every part of the submarine interior including crew members clothing and even their skin.

In addition to the amine smell, submarine crews are exposed to cooking odors, hydraulic oil vapors, diesel exhaust that isn’t quite captured by the diesel exhaust system, inboard venting of the sanitary tanks, and the smell of many closely confined people. The interiors become quite fragrant. Crew members become accustomed to it and after a while never notice it. But other people do.

One man said that when he  was attached to a submarine, he had reason to fly home for vacation wearing civilian clothes He was sitting in his  plane seat next to an older lady, chatting a bit, and suddenly she asked him, “Are you on submarines?” Surprised, he asked, “Yes, how did you know?” She replied “My husband was on submarines. I’ll never forget the smell.”

ALLISIONS AND COLLISIONS

            A boat carrying refugees sank 4 miles off the coast of Mauritania killing 89 but 9 survived. Refugee boats are almost a guarantee to a wet death.

            SAHAND, an element of the Islamic Republic of Iran Navy, is a Moudge-class frigate that simply rolled over on her side while undergoing repairs at Bandar Abbas.

            KIM JIN, a Mongolian tanker, endured a large crack in her hull that immediately caused her to sink near Malaysia. Local maritime enforcement authorities rescued the crew.

            PRESTIGE FALCON, not the Millennium Falcon, should have had Hans Solo at the helm but she did not. The 384’ Comoros-flagged tanker quietly capsized 25 miles SW of Oman. None of her 16 crew were found.

CRUISE NEWS

            For some people, there is no gravity; the world sucks. An Oklahoma family of 16 went on a trip of a lifetime cruise to Alaska at a significant cost. Several members of the family attended a lumberjack show in Ketchikan and when they went back to the bus for the trip to the Norwegian Cruise Line ship, they were told the bus was full and to wait for the next bus. You can see this coming, can’t you! Of course, there was no bus coming. They called the Port Authority that immediately sent them via van to the pier; but as expected, the ship was long gone.

            Small children were stranded on the boat, an elderly mother-in-law was on land without her needed medications, and the poor folks were without money, passports, clothes, phones, etc. Worse, without passports they could not fly to Canada to board the ship at the next stop.

            Oh my, you know this must get worse. They attempted to fly home but a connecting flight was cancelled and they were forced to spend the overnight at the airport. When they finally reached home, they were notified that a $971 fine had been placed on their credit card as punishment for missing the ship in Alaska.

 When confronted by reporters, Norwegian Cruise Lines asked for a delayed response so they could figure out what happened. 

BOAT TRADITIONS

            John Vigor posits that figureheads on the bow of a boat are an ancient rite and originally it was the actual head of a young virgin who was sacrificed to the Gods of the Sea. This concept died off in modern eras because of the difficulty in finding a virgin.

            He notes that sailboats don’t always have the right-of-way. The boat with the least ability to maneuver has the right of way. And when a faster sailboat passes a slower power boat, the sailboat must maintain clearance. The Regan Corollary is: if the freaking speedboat or entity is bearing down on you quickly and is not moving out of the way, tack. Regan Corollary 2: if the approaching vessel is a hell of a lot bigger than you, move your transom, quickly. 

HISTOR

HISTORY

            On 25 July 1956, the world was startled by the news of a TITANIC-like ship collision off the coast of the U.S. between two cruisers: the STOCKHOLM and the ANDRIA DORIA.  This particular nautical catastrophe was sensational because it was the first highly-covered catastrophe on television. ABC’s Edwin Morgan was the reporter on the scene proffering details and information. 

STOCKHOLM, the prime ship of the Swedish American Line, was 525’ long and beam of 64’. She could carry 1350 passengers catered by a crew of 330 as they headed toward Europe. The ANDRIA DORIA, the pride of Italian Cruise Lines,  was heading to the U.S. She was a magnificent ship boasting the best of Italy including statues and paintings worth over $1 million in 1956 money. She had a capacity of 1,200 passengers and a crew of 560.

The story is very complicated due to contradictory testimony from witnesses on both ships. Being after 2300 hours, a junior officer, Third Officer Johan Ernst Carstens Johannsen, was on the bridge of the Swedish ship and spotted the Italian ship about 15 minutes earlier on the radar. Captain Piero Calamai was on the bridge of ANDRIA DORIA when he noted the STOCKHOLM on the radar. Interestingly, neither ship was following the “rules of the road”. STOCKHOLM was trying to shave minutes off her schedule by being out of the normal lane of westbound traffic. The ANDRIA DORIA was breezing along without dropping speed in an area noted for dense fog. 

The basic understanding of sailing since Neptune decided the fates of Roman ships, was that when on a collision course, both ships should turn to the starboard passing port-to-port. Captain Calamai maneuvered for a more starboard-to-starboard pass. In testimony, both sides claimed to see the other on different courses.

            Johannsen believed that they were to pass port-to-port as per his education. Neither ship believed that any problems existed so no radio communication seemed necessary. Unfortunately, the entire incident suddenly became history as STOCKHOLM plowed into the side of the Italian ship rupturing 5 fuel tanks and splitting open seven of the ten decks. 

Surprisingly, the ANDRIA DORIA had a fatal design flaw of being built with full-length corridors from stem to stern which allowed water to fill the ship quickly and produced a significant list of greater than 20 degrees, the maximum list to allow lifeboat launching. Unlike the TITANIC, the ANDRIA DORIA had more than enough lifeboats, they simply couldn’t launch them. The crew did manage to drop boats without people in them, and they dropped ropes for passengers to descend. 

Being in a heavy-traffic shipping lane, the ships were surrounded by other ships. CAPE ANN, a United Fruit Co. ship, immediately steamed over to send her pair of 20-person lifeboats to the scene, THE USNS ship, PRIVATE WILLIAM H. THOMAS, and the destroyer escort, EDWARD H. ALLEN, lowered boats. Since the STOCKHOLM herself was upright, she immediately lowered her boats. It was the ILE DE FRANCE that was the closest to the collision and was able to pick up the greatest number of survivors. The butcher’s bill was 46 dead from the ANDRIA DORIA, 5 from STOCKHOLM but 3 others died of injuries or heart attacks.

While the ABC Correspondent Edwin Morgan provided constant coverage, he maintained true professionalism by showing no emotion although he was in deep anguish because his daughter was aboard the ANDRIA DORIA. In a story that made the papers worldwide, 14-year-old Linda Morgan was sleeping in the area of impact. Evidently, she was knocked unconscious because when she awoke, she was quite confused. It seems that the bow of the STOCKHOM hit directly under her bed and she was quietly deposited on the deck of the Swedish ship. She started the voyage on the ANDRIA DORIA and was rescued from the STOCKHOLM!

Linda Morgan

Recently, journalists found the now older woman who had suffered decades of survivor guilt. Her half-sister and her stepfather were among the victims, and her mother was seriously injured. Linda lives a quiet life and distains publicity. 

STOCKHOLM after the collision

ANDRIA DORIA