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Old 03-17-2015, 05:00 PM   #81
MYTraveler
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City: West Coast
Join Date: Apr 2014
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Quote:
Originally Posted by refugio View Post
And I've had vessels use it to hail me - much easier than "white power boat Northbound off of Point Watchamacallit".
One time I was transiting the front side of San Clemente Island, which the US Navy controls and sometimes closes (including surrounding waters) for "exercises". On that particular occasion, I listened for 10 minutes while the navy repeatedly tried to hail a cruise ship (and the Navy was identifying the ship only by its position, heading and speed, so it wasn't altogether surprising that the cruise ship wasn't responding, presumably because it didn't realize it was being hailed). When the cruise ship finally answered, the Navy directed a course change (something like "alter your course at least 20 degrees to port") and the cruise ship promptly complied. Within a minute or so, my AIS determined that the cruise ship had altered to a collision course with mine. So, I made a DSC call to the cruise ship (using its AIS-supplied MMSI) (likely causing its radio to beep -- not easy for the watchstander to miss) which was immediately answered, and we easily negotiated a crossing.
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