Identifying your boat on the radio

[BobH]

Back when we were cruising on our sailboat we would hail using "Sailing Vessel Escapades". No question about the type of boat. Now with a power boat how do you identify your vessel? "Motor Yacht" seems a little pretentious for a 38' boat. "Motor Boat" seems a little ambiguous since that covers a wide range of power driven boats. I thought "Pleasure Craft" might bean alternative but it too sounds kind of strange.

So what do the majority of you Trawler drivers use when you hail on the radio?

I would post this as a survey but don't know how to do that.

Bob


Bob

 

[Heron]

Motor Vessel (MV)

 

[rwidman]

"Trawler".

 

[vp1]

Back when we were cruising on our sailboat we would hail using "Sailing Vessel Escapades". No question about the type of boat. Now with a power boat how do you identify your vessel? "Motor Yacht" seems a little pretentious for a 38' boat. "Motor Boat" seems a little ambiguous since that covers a wide range of power driven boats. I thought "Pleasure Craft" might bean alternative but it too sounds kind of strange.

So what do the majority of you Trawler drivers use when you hail on the radio?

I would post this as a survey but don't know how to do that.

Bob


Bob

I don't yet have a boat, but my vote's for pleasure craft, said with emphasis on "pleasure" in a deep, smooth, funky voice.

 

[O C Diver]

Chick Magnet

Usually just the name of the vessel or name and location (Passing: Slow Hand off your stern).

Ted

 

[dhays]

Motor Vessel (MV)

+1

Motor Yacht (M/Y) does seem a little pretentious to me as well however it may be more accurate as it is clear that it is a non-commercial vessel.

 

[waddenkruiser]

German inland water ways: "Sportboot", which is close to pleasure craft. The big ones are addressing us with the same wording.
International / sea: Motor Yacht.


best regards / med venlig hilsen
Wadden

 

[jjorgenson3]

M/V and the vessel name is proper. Only if you want to be proper and we do.

 

[menzies]

Motor Vessel, but only when I feel I need to be a bit more professional about it.

Just Sonas when hailing another recreational vessel or marina etc.

Motor Vessel Sonas when hailing the coast guard, FWC, or when I hailed Invictus last weekend regarding her intentions as she was spinning to her starboard.

 

[waddenkruiser]

Might be I'm wrong (not native English) but I would expect that from a big ones perspective "Motor Vessel" sounds more pretentious than "Motor Yacht" if a +/- 40' comes around...


best regards / med venlig hilsen
Wadden

 

[Shrew]

Here is a list of the official 'Ship Prefixes':

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ship_prefix

Motor Vessel would be appropriate for all the vessels on this forum. Let's be good an honest with ourselves about the wording. If you're a Motor Yacht, you know it. You also know when you're NOT a Motor Yacht. I think common sense can prevail over marketing hype.

Announcing the type of vessel is helpful in a congested area where someone needs to identify you. If there is a Sailing Vessel in the same area, it is helpful to specify that you are the Motor Vessel. If you say Motor Yacht, many will be looking for a much different vessel than what you're operating.

 

[caltexflanc]

I just use the name of the boat. If someone wanted further clarification, I used "60 foot cream colored power boat" and where I was. Worked fine on hundreds of calls in a wide variety of situations.

 

[waddenkruiser]

I thought that using Yacht instead of Vessel would express the recreational character of my cruise...


best regards / med venlig hilsen
Wadden

 

[Shrew]

To clarify. I don't announce a vessel type either, just vessel name. Just pointing out why it might be handy and taking a dig at the pretentious 'Motor Yacht' crowd.

We did hear a guy a few years ago calling for a pumpout at Block Island, RI. He did refer to his vessel as a 32 foot motor yacht. We couldnt' stop laughing.

 

[Busterbrown]

Scrambler 32 foot power

 

[waddenkruiser]

I checked against the rules published in Germany and what I was asked for the VHF certificate: There is stated "S/Y" and "M/Y" if cruising as a recreational.
Seems there are different interpretations about the words.
I never experienced here in Scandinavia that someone would take my call "here is M/Y.." not serious


best regards / med venlig hilsen
Wadden

 

[kthoennes]

...Motor Yacht (M/Y) does seem a little pretentious to me as well however it may be more accurate as it is clear that it is a non-commercial vessel.

Mainship specifically named our boat model the "37 Motoryacht" but that always sounds pretentious to me too. I usually just give the name instead, unless identifying the boat specifically is important for some reason. Even then, I'll usually say something like "This is Xanadu, white motor vessel with a green canvas top" which is much more helpful I think.

 

[Steve]

"Pleasure boat" is what I use, down here "trawler" means just one thing, a shrimp boat.

 

[FlyWright]

As an ID on an initial radio call, I say "FlyWright". On the next transmission with my request or message, I typically say I'm a Pleasure Trawler or a Recreational Trawler, burgundy on white.

I've never had someone ask me for clarification, so it must be sufficient for the purposes.

 

[ksanders]

We use "MV Lisas Way"

The reason we use MV is because our boats name doesnt sound like a boat name.

 

[MYTraveler]

Usually just the name, but when the other party needs more information to get a visual on my boat I typically include 64' power boat. By the way, that worked the one time I had (got) to hail Invictus.

 

[menzies]

Usually just the name, but when the other party needs more information to get a visual on my boat I typically include 64' power boat. By the way, that worked the one time I had (got) to hail Invictus.

Where was she and why were you hailing her?

Mine was when she was just leaving dry dock on the St John's stopped in the middle of the river and started spinning to the east (to her port). I was planning passing her to port. So I hailed and asked her intentions as if she was moving I would pass to her starboard. He told me to proceed on the starboard.

 

[MYTraveler]

Santa Monica Bay, leaving MdR en route to its mooring in Newport Beach (CA).

 

[Northern Spy]

Motor Vessel would be appropriate for all the vessels on this forum...

Actually. No. Motor Vessel is any vessel more than 65 feet in length, which is propelled by machinery other than steam. Often times this is implied as a commercial vessel.

In the US, Most of the vessels on this forum are class iii or class iv motorboats.

In Canada, pleasure craft or recreational vessel is the proper term.

Granted, terminology doesn't mean a heck of a when you're cruising around a bunch of other pleasure craft on weekends, sipping your martini and adjusting your cravat, while plowing through the local dinghy race. But once you encounter real shipping or in a traffic scheme, identifying yourself as a motor vessel is inappropriate, because the other party would be looking for something resembling a ship.

 

[Poach]

sipping your martini and adjusting your cravat, while plowing through the local dinghy race. QUOTE]


Now that's the kind of multi-tasking I'm talking about!

 

[dannc]

...
I never experienced here in Scandinavia that someone would take my call "here is M/Y.." not serious

best regards / med venlig hilsen
Wadden

Wadden,

I suspect that the pretentiousness of the word "yacht" is an American English/Culture issue. In the US, a "yacht" is often considered a rich man's boat.

I have always wondered why Lovey and Thurston Howell, with all of their money, would take a three hour tour on the SS Minnow. Of course, the SS Minnow really should be the M/V Minnow or the M/Y Minnow since she was not a Steam Ship but we can't expect a TV show to be perfect.

The Howells really would have owned the M/Y Minnow but the Gilligan, The Skipper, Mary Ann, and The Professor would have been on the M/V Minnow. Ginger really would have been a guest on the M/Y Minnow owned by the Howells, Ginger simply did not belong with the rest of the guest and the crew.

Hopefully the last two paragraphs made no sense to you because, if it did make sense, it would mean you watched too many episodes of a very silly US TV show.

Later,
Dan

 

[kthoennes]

And then there's Judge Smails' yacht The Flying Wasp.

 

[Northern Spy]

And then there's Judge Smails' yacht The Flying Wasp.

Hey! You scratched my anchor.

 

[menzies]

identifying yourself as a motor vessel is inappropriate, because the other party would be looking for something resembling a ship.

When I picked my boat up in Stuart I turned om the AIS as we went north. After the first day I checked how it showed on the MarineTraffic page. Boy was I surprised to see the PO had set her at 55 meters long by 15 meters on the beam. So meters instead of feet! Since I had to download software and hook up a laptop to the AIS to change it, I decided to leave it until I got home.

Since my family back in Ireland were monitoring our progress I left the AIS on anyway.

On the third day, somewhere between Daytona and Jax, I was hailed by a small trawler heading south. He asked me if I knew what my AIS was sending. I explained what was happening.

He said they saw us on their GPS from a mile back and thought there was a Carnival cruise liner coming up the ICW.

 

[Codger2]

We use "this is the motor vessel Sandpiper."