Excellent points made, Tom. I just left the US Coast Guard. My last CO forbid the use of vector charts on our lifeboat nav systems after a reservist put one on a rock. I had a couple close calls on vector myself, having to come to a grinding all stop after zooming in to some unseen snag. I say this conviction with humility, knowing these ocean racers can navigate circles around me, but over the years I became convinced that there’s no room for vector charts when serious navigation is required. Vector seems like it was made for weekend boaters, to make reading a chart less intimidating. Pros are used to looking at raster on land, why change that at sea?? Again, I speak with humility. These racers may use whatever chart they prefer, but my conviction stands.
I was raised by map nerds, especially my mother. She was an architect, and when I was a baby she left me with a babysitter and worked in a cartographers office. Later, on our many land based journeys the front passenger seat was a place of privilege and responsibility. My brother and sister and I watched the clock with an eagle eye to get our allotted share. One responsibility was navigation, and the standards were high. There were 4 expert critics watching. Sometimes the navigator got to pick destinations. It was a great way to teach maps. And we traveled a lot. In 1966 we went to Europe for 3 months and drove 10,000 miles. So I’ve embraced electronic maps, although even for land use I try to keep some paper maps around, including high resolution ones. And I’ve seen all the issues you mention on the land maps too. Raster maps done by competent marine cartographers, like in one of your other videos, are great, although they are more likely to be out of date than vector ones. I wonder if some companies just print out vector maps without applying the sailors eye. Of course in many places maps are not enough. Maps don’t tell you how to use tidal eddies, or how to shoot bridges, or the effects of headlands on the wind, or how the last tide affected the sandbar, or what’s been dredged last week. There’s no substitute for local knowledge, navigational aids, and pilots. And studying the maps in detail. From other comments, it sounds like anyone local would have known about the reef. Perhaps the navigator was as impressed with his skill and knowledge as you are.
What a fantastic childhood. It was a great way to teach youngsters and engage them on long journeys. Your parents sound special. Thanks for sharing. Tom
Tom, thank you for your time and effort. What sort of an idiot would think of giving a thumbs down for something so serious and simply explained. Guess..different people make up this beautiful world.
A lot of thumbs down are people trying to stop youtube reccomemding videos they are not interested in. So while it appears they dislike or think the video is no good a huge percentage just are trying to get the videos they want to pop up on their feed. I kno this is a year old post just thought id let you in on it. Cheers
As a recently retired software developer (now hoping to spend a lot more time sailing), I have to ask whether this is still the situation today? Identifying obstacles/shallows in the vicinity of a vessel and, along with a warning message, displaying them on a screen, is not a particularly difficult task - and no other source of information is better suited to that task than vector data. The development would be time consuming, but very doable. It's disturbing to think that companies producing these products don't consider such a feature to be essential. Comparatively cheap Android/iOS apps can (and do) have it. They may not be designed to "look good" on a yacht or integrate well with existing systems, but if what I read here is still true in 2020, then my plan for my new boat will be to remove the plotters to save energy and use my tablet instead. In my humble opinion, the navigator wasn't the only one to blame. Apparently the old adage still holds true: 'To err is human, to really f#*! things up you need a computer!'
Totally agree, vector charts are here to stay for a very good reason, to be able to overcome that short coming is the answer. I have made the mistake of not zooming in with thank fully no consequences, and yet I am normally a careful navigator.
My chart plotter is well over 10 years old and would have avoided the Volvo incident... you can tell a chart plotter to plot a course from A to B, and to avoid known shallow water and it will, you just have to turn on that functionality : )
You are right Sir, it is risky to comment on another's disaster but it is important to hear from Highly Skilled Mariners like yourself. We learn from the mistakes of others and as you did not judge the navigator you did well to comment. I feel very sorry for ALL the crew of Vestas. If one likes, they can say all mariners are fools to do what they do, when every wave or shore or other boat is a potential disaster waiting to destroy ship and crew. Racing is not for the faint of heart. The best outcome is they all got off alive to race again. Never turn your back on the Sea- Ever!
Thank you Tom, having had to almost come to blows with skippers and navigators completely besotted with the technological wizardry of vector charts, to stop them sailing into well charted and obvious hazards on paper and raster charts, I just can’t believe that such fundamentally treacherously dangerous things as vector charts have become almost universally used in marine navigation
It never ceases to amaze how so many people have sailed about the world and survived? Pinnacles come up from the depths in the most unlikely of places. I'm a bit paranoid but I've never hit anything because I've walked every step of the track, before I've raised the anchor.
I see this all the time. Great swathes of blue everywhere, and when you zoom in, all kinds of hazards appear. The nature of islands is such that a headland often has an island nearby, and that island has a lesser one, and so on. This means that the effective headland is on the seaward end of the smallest island, whereas the plotter shows only the headland, if you're not zoomed in enough. The default is to fill the island with blue, where the plotter should really fill the gaps between the headland and each of islands with brown. The other problem is that, even where the resolution of the screen is quite adequate to show the hazard clearly enough to someone viewing it, indeed you might expect it to be quite big on the screen, it just disappears. At the next level of zoom, it appears, together with a huge amount of other detail, which is not so necessay. In other words, the huge jump in the level of displayed detail is not commensurate with the quite small change in zoom level. I would say that these problems are not inherent in vector charts per se, but arise because of faulty policies implemented in the software which displays the data.
It is certainly the navigators fault. A good tradesman doesn't blame his tools. When planning and plotting a course on an electronic chart that spans hundreds of NM and many days sailing, just as you would on paper charts, you need to spend the time zooming in to the largest scale to check the detail. Standard passage planning procedure, which is checked and re-checked en route. In 2004, I sailed direct non-stop from Guadeloupe to Colon, a long 8 day passage. I plotted the course on my electronic charting software, initially starting small scale of course. The route was well offshore of the South American coastline, north of the ABC islands, and appeared to be safe and clear of any hazards. But I spent a few hours zooming in to the highest detail to check for hazards. And lo and behold, up popped a small rocky uninhabited island that my plotted course line dissected. It was in the middle of the Caribbean Sea and had I not done what any navigator should do, we would have probably smashed into it at 0300h unaware. Never be complacent, never cut corners. Your life literally depends on it!
If you read the MAIB report you will see it wasn't that simple. The navigator had spent considerable time plotting a safe course for the leg but, the night before departure, the race organisers re-routed the fleet due to variations in weather and piracy risk, meaning the navigator was rushed in creating a new course. Not blameless perhaps, but not a simple case of incompetence.
Excellent point Tom. However, surely a vector chart programmer could add a calculation feature that upon execution examines the traverse between two supplied waypoints at all scales to check that there are no potential collisions with existing charted artefacts. Simple geometry really, especially with vectors. Should only add a few minutes to the course plotting process.
A couple of boats ago I was coming in to Stamford CT and I was giving vector charts a go, having never used one before, but it showed everything to be quite clear, and I cleared the hurricane barrier, and kept on up the river towards the marina motoring along gallantly at 6 knots when suddenly, the boat feels funny. Error on my part for not checking the paper chart nor running a fathometer before entering a strange harbor, but in my mind this was no Bahamas backwater this was a proper US harbor. Well by the time i realized things weren't right boat speed had dropped to nil, and all the motoring did nothing but tirn us a bit. We were right good and stuck in the mud, on a falling tide right in front of a public park, just to add insult to injury! Well by the time the tide had finished going out we were well and good out of the water, dried out on her side, infront of a public park humiliated I was. Then when the next tide came to lift us off about half the port side was stained this aweful grey-brown, and we sheepishly tirned right around and sailed for Hartford, deck brushes to hand in an effort to scrub away put shame.....
As a programmer it grinds my gears there is no option to have routing take account of "deep layer" hazards, or for a "deep layer" hazard warning to sound. So even if you're approaching a reef on a zoom-out, the computer code should still be looking for it.
It's a while since I read the enquiry into this (and both you and the navigator in question are streets ahead of any claim I could have to proficiency) but I seem to recall that there was something about the race mandating one set of charts on one system being a certain standard and a lower standard being available as a backup, many boats had upgraded the second system to match the first, but if I recall the one which ran aground hadn't. Similarly the carefully planned passage was ditched the night before when the route was changed to avoid a weather system. I seem to remember that they were aware of the reef but didn't believe it reached the surface. All in all a cautionary tale that even the best most elite person can mess up when tired and rushed and everything should be as idiot proof as possible (which thoroughly suits me :-)!)
It shows the importance of zooming along the intended course on the chartplotter before and on passage. I have found it tempting to leave on a scale that doesn't show all the detail but shows the destination, possibly leading to encounters with reefs. I found missing navigation buoys on Garmin software even zoomed in. (PS I had a few drinks with you many moons ago in the Stag at Cemaes, you were on Menai 1.)
I wish that you'd be able to select what gets removed from the vector chart as pat of the settings.. Until then I make sure I make any navigational decisions based on what I see at 1:1 scale and the safety depth is set correctly.
A very nice info ...I say “ So two plotters are key for fast boats “.. one to navigate one to sail with on details nearby.. I made all most a similar mistake ...me planning ahead to sail a short cut “slank” at the “waddenzee” where I almost forgot a detail to check before entering that “slank” ( a slank is a tide made channel that shifts a bit during time. ) To my horror I forgot to see if the tide was right and so the depths.. the plotter does not think about this at all .. and it even does not show as prompted in de video. Next time I will set an alarm to make me aware to check the conditions on time so I can make a good discussion . Thanks for sharing Tom .. this was very educational!
You were very diplomatic regarding the skill of Volvo navigator but let's face it he should have known the shortcomings of Vector charts and after plotting his course should have run down the entire length of his route to check for hazards. Human error maybe but as a professional there was no excuse for his stuff up and was justifiably fired.
I totally agree the chart is the problem. But it's not really because of the nature of *vector charts* that you don't see any detail at oceanic level. It's a choice in the programming. I've discussed with Navionics people about the way the rendering is done. In my understanding the developers have left way too much decision taking to a *database* and not enough to algorithm. Navionics support have commented that for an object to show past in a certain lower zoom level (in Navionics, that's level 6 and lower), it need to be specially marked in the database. These last decades of web development have shown that maps rendering can be vastly improved. Look at Google Maps, for example, and see how it selects the names of streets that are relevant. Nautical vector charts have a long way to go. To some degree, I think Nautical charts are simpler than street maps. My exchange with Navionics was about "Plateau des Roches-Douvres", in Northern Brittany, France, which hides at zoom level 6 and below, whereas a lot of smaller objects show at that level.
Thanks for this. I agree that often the problems are caused by the programming. The information is usually there on the chart, it's just that it doesn't show up at the scale chosen. Having a raster to hand, or a paper chart generally does away with the issue. Your comments much appreciated.
This problem can be overcome by having a program that the nav can set a depth (depth of keel+ depth x to spare) that will show up anything shallower regardless of scale.
Very interesting Mark. I'm sure it'll come. There seems no end to the march of technology. I'm sure you'd agree that it still remains our duty to be able to look after ourselves beyond the parameters of electronics.
Yet more proof of Sod's Law. From my lad stepping in the only pile of dog's muck at the end of the Prince of Wales pier in Dover to hitting a reef in the middle of an ocean.....
Not a sailor but would seem simple enough to have a vector plotted on a zoomed out scale alert to hazards not visible at that scale. In fact such that it would be so easy to program such an alert I would suggest that this software feature would be present and the dappy navigator simply did not have full understanding of his software tools.
Hello Tom, (Sorry for my "franchie" English). Well I understand you do not want to blame anybody, but sometimes you have to. This guy had a job he had to do. He wes a professional. He had plenty of time to prepare his navigation. In this area, these reefs are one of the rare dangerous places. When preparing the voyage he should have pointed the major risks on his route. I know the place and I was horrified by what happened. In those seas where 90% of the time you find no sounding, because it is far too deep, as soon as your echo sounder finds the bottom, you have to wake up and check and re-check, and also take margins with the danger. You have a crew on board! Not talking about the financial side. No excuse. I understand that mistake is human. If I had made the same mistake I would have been to be blamed. By the way I know the place. I was navigating around the world and was in this area in 2012, cruising with my wife coming from Australia and sailing towards South Africa. I had on board all raster charts AND vector charts.It takes no place. I do not understand at all that these hugely expensive boats, going along with a huge amount of money involved for everything (crew, sails and so on) do not have all the formats available (raster and vector). I can also witness that I found that, on vector charts, particularly where no merchant navigation is involved, as soon as you are far away from commercial navigation, the vector charts are not to be trusted. In 2011, I found that a group of islands, the duke of Gloucester archipelago in the Tuamotu, was missing on the vector charts. Of course it appeared on the raster charts. I have an explanation for that, and this is not about layers, but about missing information. It appeared to me when sailing back to France I found that the spelling of gulf of Biscaye was strangely "Indian looking". I do not remember exactly, but it was evident that this data "gulf of Biscay" had been entered by someone who had no knowledge of navigation, and also whose native langage was probably Indian. By the way India is one of those countries where you can find computer people in great number and for a cheap cost to enter information. If you come back to the beginning of electronic navigation, it is amazing at what speed the electronic VECTOT charts have been made available. Scanning a paper chart to make a raster chart is simple. It is a photo. You do not have to enter all the detailed information. But with vector charts it is an other story. They had to subcontract the entering of the datas to people who where data operators, bur no charterers. SO, I would never ever enough say, take care when using a vector charts in remote places, where it is possible that the charts may have been considered of minor importance, and on which details might have been forgotten.
That is a really helpful comment from a serious sailor. Thank you Jean-Luc for sharing your knowledge and experience. Fair winds, wherever you are now, Tom PS No need to apologize for the English. If my French were half as good I'd be a proud man.
I do not know if I am a "serious sailor". But I have been lucky enough to sail around the world two times. (ruclips.net/video/22yKnIepLMA/видео.html). One point I have not mentioned (that most of people would not know) is that we are talking about a reef that is about 30 miles long, called Cargados or Carajos Shoals, It is in fact a huge barrier that you can to ignore, or forget. Most of it is under the water, depending on the weather. It is in no way a zone that you can approach without a certain amount of anxiety. So, even if the planned route of that racing yacht was drawn as a tenant to avoid that reef, even if being in a race and wanting to take the shortest route, when you approach a 30 miles long obstacle, you cannot say that, for a question of layer, you have forgotten its existence. You must have prepared that approach (clock alarm, sounding alarm, radar alarm if not very efficient but some parts are above the water)...) and in any case, after having sailed for days, constantly in waters over 1000 meters deep, sometimes 2000 deep, when your alarm tells the depth sounder has found the bottom it means that you are already on the shelf, nearly on the reef. There is no option but taking and turning backwards, immediately (even if it is difficult on those yachts). With modern navigation systems, you can draw an alarm zone in which you have to take special care or in which you do not want to enter in any case). And that zone (if I remember well) is totally independent from the layers. It is a transparent layer. So even at a large scale maybe you would not see the reef, but you would see the zone of no-entrance. Last point and it doesn't excuse the navigator totally. It is quite strange that at the widest scale a 30 miles long reef doesn't appear. This point, about the length of the obstacle is very important to precise. The only reason is that it is not One island but whole thing mostly under the water, with moving sand banks. You are perfectly right to point that problem, which should be submitted to the international organisations. Any danger in the open sea that is a potential danger for a boat -and they are many- should be visible at any scale, at least with a small logo or sign (which would do not harm to the readability of the charts) which tells you to check down in the layers. Last point, it is not completely true that all dangers are seen on a large scale paper chart. After having sailed the Med for years and years, I found the existence of the Columbretes island. I confess I did not know anything about them. They lie between the Balearic Islands and Spain. 39°53'51.59"N 0°41'14.59"E. So let us stay humble..
Tom, your restraint is admirable, but come on, this professional navigator should have had his CoC taken away for such an elementary error. If there had been lose of life in this case one would hope he would have lost much more than his ticket. A navigator failing to check his or her planned track is clear of hazards by checking the lower zooms is simply negligent. As a 'mere' Ocean Master examiner you are letting this man off way too lightly imho.
I wish that you'd be able to select what gets removed from the vector chart as pat of the settings.. Until then I make sure I make any navigational decisions based on what I see at 1:1 scale and the safety depth is set correctly.
Excellent points made, Tom. I just left the US Coast Guard. My last CO forbid the use of vector charts on our lifeboat nav systems after a reservist put one on a rock. I had a couple close calls on vector myself, having to come to a grinding all stop after zooming in to some unseen snag. I say this conviction with humility, knowing these ocean racers can navigate circles around me, but over the years I became convinced that there’s no room for vector charts when serious navigation is required. Vector seems like it was made for weekend boaters, to make reading a chart less intimidating. Pros are used to looking at raster on land, why change that at sea?? Again, I speak with humility. These racers may use whatever chart they prefer, but my conviction stands.
Thanks Fernando. Very interesting to hear about your experiences with vectors too and I think your summoning up completely appropriate. Tom
I was raised by map nerds, especially my mother. She was an architect, and when I was a baby she left me with a babysitter and worked in a cartographers office. Later, on our many land based journeys the front passenger seat was a place of privilege and responsibility. My brother and sister and I watched the clock with an eagle eye to get our allotted share. One responsibility was navigation, and the standards were high. There were 4 expert critics watching. Sometimes the navigator got to pick destinations. It was a great way to teach maps. And we traveled a lot. In 1966 we went to Europe for 3 months and drove 10,000 miles.
So I’ve embraced electronic maps, although even for land use I try to keep some paper maps around, including high resolution ones. And I’ve seen all the issues you mention on the land maps too. Raster maps done by competent marine cartographers, like in one of your other videos, are great, although they are more likely to be out of date than vector ones. I wonder if some companies just print out vector maps without applying the sailors eye.
Of course in many places maps are not enough. Maps don’t tell you how to use tidal eddies, or how to shoot bridges, or the effects of headlands on the wind, or how the last tide affected the sandbar, or what’s been dredged last week. There’s no substitute for local knowledge, navigational aids, and pilots. And studying the maps in detail. From other comments, it sounds like anyone local would have known about the reef. Perhaps the navigator was as impressed with his skill and knowledge as you are.
What a fantastic childhood. It was a great way to teach youngsters and engage them on long journeys. Your parents sound special. Thanks for sharing. Tom
Quite interesting. Came across it by accident when looking for a folk singer in nz but happy I found this, learned something.
Tom, thank you for your time and effort. What sort of an idiot would think of giving a thumbs down for something so serious and simply explained. Guess..different people make up this beautiful world.
A lot of thumbs down are people trying to stop youtube reccomemding videos they are not interested in. So while it appears they dislike or think the video is no good a huge percentage just are trying to get the videos they want to pop up on their feed. I kno this is a year old post just thought id let you in on it. Cheers
As a recently retired software developer (now hoping to spend a lot more time sailing), I have to ask whether this is still the situation today? Identifying obstacles/shallows in the vicinity of a vessel and, along with a warning message, displaying them on a screen, is not a particularly difficult task - and no other source of information is better suited to that task than vector data. The development would be time consuming, but very doable. It's disturbing to think that companies producing these products don't consider such a feature to be essential. Comparatively cheap Android/iOS apps can (and do) have it. They may not be designed to "look good" on a yacht or integrate well with existing systems, but if what I read here is still true in 2020, then my plan for my new boat will be to remove the plotters to save energy and use my tablet instead.
In my humble opinion, the navigator wasn't the only one to blame. Apparently the old adage still holds true: 'To err is human, to really f#*! things up you need a computer!'
Totally agree, vector charts are here to stay for a very good reason, to be able to overcome that short coming is the answer. I have made the mistake of not zooming in with thank fully no consequences, and yet I am normally a careful navigator.
My chart plotter is well over 10 years old and would have avoided the Volvo incident... you can tell a chart plotter to plot a course from A to B, and to avoid known shallow water and it will, you just have to turn on that functionality : )
Completely right! Always check your paper charts in unknown territory!
You are right Sir, it is risky to comment on another's disaster but it is important to hear from Highly Skilled Mariners like yourself. We learn from the mistakes of others and as you did not judge the navigator you did well to comment. I feel very sorry for ALL the crew of Vestas. If one likes, they can say all mariners are fools to do what they do, when every wave or shore or other boat is a potential disaster waiting to destroy ship and crew. Racing is not for the faint of heart. The best outcome is they all got off alive to race again. Never turn your back on the Sea- Ever!
Thanks Sea Shepherds. I'm really glad you appreciated my take on it. Tom
Thank you Tom, having had to almost come to blows with skippers and navigators completely besotted with the technological wizardry of vector charts, to stop them sailing into well charted and obvious hazards on paper and raster charts, I just can’t believe that such fundamentally treacherously dangerous things as vector charts have become almost universally used in marine navigation
As you say, it beggars belief!
Guilty...... Never again. ;(
Most interesting and very enlightning explaination on the differences between raster and vector charts
Glad you found it useful.
Wow! great advice and warning
It never ceases to amaze how so many people have sailed about the world and survived? Pinnacles come up from the depths in the most unlikely of places. I'm a bit paranoid but I've never hit anything because I've walked every step of the track, before I've raised the anchor.
Very good point and well explained. The devil is in the details 👍🏼☺️
I see this all the time. Great swathes of blue everywhere, and when you zoom in, all kinds of hazards appear. The nature of islands is such that a headland often has an island nearby, and that island has a lesser one, and so on. This means that the effective headland is on the seaward end of the smallest island, whereas the plotter shows only the headland, if you're not zoomed in enough. The default is to fill the island with blue, where the plotter should really fill the gaps between the headland and each of islands with brown.
The other problem is that, even where the resolution of the screen is quite adequate to show the hazard clearly enough to someone viewing it, indeed you might expect it to be quite big on the screen, it just disappears. At the next level of zoom, it appears, together with a huge amount of other detail, which is not so necessay. In other words, the huge jump in the level of displayed detail is not commensurate with the quite small change in zoom level. I would say that these problems are not inherent in vector charts per se, but arise because of faulty policies implemented in the software which displays the data.
It is certainly the navigators fault. A good tradesman doesn't blame his tools. When planning and plotting a course on an electronic chart that spans hundreds of NM and many days sailing, just as you would on paper charts, you need to spend the time zooming in to the largest scale to check the detail. Standard passage planning procedure, which is checked and re-checked en route.
In 2004, I sailed direct non-stop from Guadeloupe to Colon, a long 8 day passage. I plotted the course on my electronic charting software, initially starting small scale of course. The route was well offshore of the South American coastline, north of the ABC islands, and appeared to be safe and clear of any hazards. But I spent a few hours zooming in to the highest detail to check for hazards. And lo and behold, up popped a small rocky uninhabited island that my plotted course line dissected. It was in the middle of the Caribbean Sea and had I not done what any navigator should do, we would have probably smashed into it at 0300h unaware. Never be complacent, never cut corners. Your life literally depends on it!
If you read the MAIB report you will see it wasn't that simple. The navigator had spent considerable time plotting a safe course for the leg but, the night before departure, the race organisers re-routed the fleet due to variations in weather and piracy risk, meaning the navigator was rushed in creating a new course. Not blameless perhaps, but not a simple case of incompetence.
Excellent point Tom. However, surely a vector chart programmer could add a calculation feature that upon execution examines the traverse between two supplied waypoints at all scales to check that there are no potential collisions with existing charted artefacts. Simple geometry really, especially with vectors. Should only add a few minutes to the course plotting process.
A couple of boats ago I was coming in to Stamford CT and I was giving vector charts a go, having never used one before, but it showed everything to be quite clear, and I cleared the hurricane barrier, and kept on up the river towards the marina motoring along gallantly at 6 knots when suddenly, the boat feels funny. Error on my part for not checking the paper chart nor running a fathometer before entering a strange harbor, but in my mind this was no Bahamas backwater this was a proper US harbor. Well by the time i realized things weren't right boat speed had dropped to nil, and all the motoring did nothing but tirn us a bit.
We were right good and stuck in the mud, on a falling tide right in front of a public park, just to add insult to injury!
Well by the time the tide had finished going out we were well and good out of the water, dried out on her side, infront of a public park humiliated I was. Then when the next tide came to lift us off about half the port side was stained this aweful grey-brown, and we sheepishly tirned right around and sailed for Hartford, deck brushes to hand in an effort to scrub away put shame.....
Rasta charts, man. Made of de purest hemp!
You are so right Tom, whether it be nautical charts or automotive GPS's, always resort to paper charts/maps before leaving the dock/driveway
As a programmer it grinds my gears there is no option to have routing take account of "deep layer" hazards, or for a "deep layer" hazard warning to sound. So even if you're approaching a reef on a zoom-out, the computer code should still be looking for it.
Glad I listened to this... thank you
You're more than welcome Stuart. Tom
It's a while since I read the enquiry into this (and both you and the navigator in question are streets ahead of any claim I could have to proficiency) but I seem to recall that there was something about the race mandating one set of charts on one system being a certain standard and a lower standard being available as a backup, many boats had upgraded the second system to match the first, but if I recall the one which ran aground hadn't. Similarly the carefully planned passage was ditched the night before when the route was changed to avoid a weather system. I seem to remember that they were aware of the reef but didn't believe it reached the surface. All in all a cautionary tale that even the best most elite person can mess up when tired and rushed and everything should be as idiot proof as possible (which thoroughly suits me :-)!)
It shows the importance of zooming along the intended course on the chartplotter before and on passage. I have found it tempting to leave on a scale that doesn't show all the detail but shows the destination, possibly leading to encounters with reefs. I found missing navigation buoys on Garmin software even zoomed in. (PS I had a few drinks with you many moons ago in the Stag at Cemaes, you were on Menai 1.)
I wish that you'd be able to select what gets removed from the vector chart as pat of the settings.. Until then I make sure I make any navigational decisions based on what I see at 1:1 scale and the safety depth is set correctly.
A very nice info ...I say “ So two plotters are key for fast boats “..
one to navigate one to sail with on details nearby..
I made all most a similar mistake ...me planning ahead to sail a short cut “slank” at the “waddenzee” where I almost forgot a detail to check before entering that “slank” ( a slank is a tide made channel that shifts a bit during time. )
To my horror I forgot to see if the tide was right and so the depths..
the plotter does not think about this at all .. and it even does not show as prompted in de video.
Next time I will set an alarm to make me aware to check the conditions on time so I can make a good discussion .
Thanks for sharing Tom .. this was very educational!
I'm glad it was useful Victor. Interesting place the Waddenzee! I've never managed to predict the tidal steams out of Harlingen.
I see the same problem of "scale" with computer-aided drafting in Architects' and Civil Engineers' drafting studios. I still trust paper!
What excuse do you have for the Costa Concordia?
A red pixel to indicate that there is data at a lower there would seem to me to solve the problem.
You were very diplomatic regarding the skill of Volvo navigator but let's face it he should have known the shortcomings of Vector charts and after plotting his course should have run down the entire length of his route to check for hazards. Human error maybe but as a professional there was no excuse for his stuff up and was justifiably fired.
I totally agree the chart is the problem. But it's not really because of the nature of *vector charts* that you don't see any detail at oceanic level. It's a choice in the programming. I've discussed with Navionics people about the way the rendering is done. In my understanding the developers have left way too much decision taking to a *database* and not enough to algorithm. Navionics support have commented that for an object to show past in a certain lower zoom level (in Navionics, that's level 6 and lower), it need to be specially marked in the database. These last decades of web development have shown that maps rendering can be vastly improved. Look at Google Maps, for example, and see how it selects the names of streets that are relevant. Nautical vector charts have a long way to go. To some degree, I think Nautical charts are simpler than street maps. My exchange with Navionics was about "Plateau des Roches-Douvres", in Northern Brittany, France, which hides at zoom level 6 and below, whereas a lot of smaller objects show at that level.
Thanks for this. I agree that often the problems are caused by the programming. The information is usually there on the chart, it's just that it doesn't show up at the scale chosen. Having a raster to hand, or a paper chart generally does away with the issue. Your comments much appreciated.
This problem can be overcome by having a program that the nav can set a depth (depth of keel+ depth x to spare) that will show up anything shallower regardless of scale.
Very interesting Mark. I'm sure it'll come. There seems no end to the march of technology. I'm sure you'd agree that it still remains our duty to be able to look after ourselves beyond the parameters of electronics.
Lucky it wasn't an oil tanker.
Measure twice cut once always.
Yet more proof of Sod's Law. From my lad stepping in the only pile of dog's muck at the end of the Prince of Wales pier in Dover to hitting a reef in the middle of an ocean.....
ha! me too!
Not a sailor but would seem
simple enough to have a vector plotted on a zoomed out scale alert to hazards not visible at that scale. In fact such that it would be so easy to program such an alert I would suggest that this software feature would be present and the dappy navigator simply did not have full understanding of his software tools.
Hello Tom, (Sorry for my "franchie" English). Well I understand you do not want to blame anybody, but sometimes you have to. This guy had a job he had to do. He wes a professional. He had plenty of time to prepare his navigation. In this area, these reefs are one of the rare dangerous places. When preparing the voyage he should have pointed the major risks on his route. I know the place and I was horrified by what happened. In those seas where 90% of the time you find no sounding, because it is far too deep, as soon as your echo sounder finds the bottom, you have to wake up and check and re-check, and also take margins with the danger. You have a crew on board! Not talking about the financial side. No excuse. I understand that mistake is human. If I had made the same mistake I would have been to be blamed. By the way I know the place. I was navigating around the world and was in this area in 2012, cruising with my wife coming from Australia and sailing towards South Africa. I had on board all raster charts AND vector charts.It takes no place. I do not understand at all that these hugely expensive boats, going along with a huge amount of money involved for everything (crew, sails and so on) do not have all the formats available (raster and vector). I can also witness that I found that, on vector charts, particularly where no merchant navigation is involved, as soon as you are far away from commercial navigation, the vector charts are not to be trusted. In 2011, I found that a group of islands, the duke of Gloucester archipelago in the Tuamotu, was missing on the vector charts. Of course it appeared on the raster charts. I have an explanation for that, and this is not about layers, but about missing information. It appeared to me when sailing back to France I found that the spelling of gulf of Biscaye was strangely "Indian looking". I do not remember exactly, but it was evident that this data "gulf of Biscay" had been entered by someone who had no knowledge of navigation, and also whose native langage was probably Indian. By the way India is one of those countries where you can find computer people in great number and for a cheap cost to enter information. If you come back to the beginning of electronic navigation, it is amazing at what speed the electronic VECTOT charts have been made available. Scanning a paper chart to make a raster chart is simple. It is a photo. You do not have to enter all the detailed information. But with vector charts it is an other story. They had to subcontract the entering of the datas to people who where data operators, bur no charterers. SO, I would never ever enough say, take care when using a vector charts in remote places, where it is possible that the charts may have been considered of minor importance, and on which details might have been forgotten.
That is a really helpful comment from a serious sailor. Thank you Jean-Luc for sharing your knowledge and experience.
Fair winds, wherever you are now,
Tom
PS No need to apologize for the English. If my French were half as good I'd be a proud man.
Retired now😊 I just bought an old gaffer to end with. Time has come for real stuff 😊😊
I do not know if I am a "serious sailor". But I have been lucky enough to sail around the world two times. (ruclips.net/video/22yKnIepLMA/видео.html).
One point I have not mentioned (that most of people would not know) is that we are talking about a reef that is about 30 miles long, called Cargados or Carajos Shoals, It is in fact a huge barrier that you can to ignore, or forget. Most of it is under the water, depending on the weather. It is in no way a zone that you can approach without a certain amount of anxiety. So, even if the planned route of that racing yacht was drawn as a tenant to avoid that reef, even if being in a race and wanting to take the shortest route, when you approach a 30 miles long obstacle, you cannot say that, for a question of layer, you have forgotten its existence. You must have prepared that approach (clock alarm, sounding alarm, radar alarm if not very efficient but some parts are above the water)...) and in any case, after having sailed for days, constantly in waters over 1000 meters deep, sometimes 2000 deep, when your alarm tells the depth sounder has found the bottom it means that you are already on the shelf, nearly on the reef. There is no option but taking and turning backwards, immediately (even if it is difficult on those yachts). With modern navigation systems, you can draw an alarm zone in which you have to take special care or in which you do not want to enter in any case). And that zone (if I remember well) is totally independent from the layers. It is a transparent layer. So even at a large scale maybe you would not see the reef, but you would see the zone of no-entrance. Last point and it doesn't excuse the navigator totally. It is quite strange that at the widest scale a 30 miles long reef doesn't appear. This point, about the length of the obstacle is very important to precise. The only reason is that it is not One island but whole thing mostly under the water, with moving sand banks. You are perfectly right to point that problem, which should be submitted to the international organisations. Any danger in the open sea that is a potential danger for a boat -and they are many- should be visible at any scale, at least with a small logo or sign (which would do not harm to the readability of the charts) which tells you to check down in the layers.
Last point, it is not completely true that all dangers are seen on a large scale paper chart. After having sailed the Med for years and years, I found the existence of the Columbretes island. I confess I did not know anything about them. They lie between the Balearic Islands and Spain. 39°53'51.59"N 0°41'14.59"E. So let us stay humble..
Dude made a big mistake.
Now, the blaming of the equipment etc is pure bullshit.
Volvo navigator my ass.
Tom, your restraint is admirable, but come on, this professional navigator should have had his CoC taken away for such an elementary error. If there had been lose of life in this case one would hope he would have lost much more than his ticket. A navigator failing to check his or her planned track is clear of hazards by checking the lower zooms is simply negligent. As a 'mere' Ocean Master examiner you are letting this man off way too lightly imho.
Have you ever sailed that fast ?
@@dirtywetdogboatsandsailing6805 Ever pondered on the purpose of passage planning Steve?
@@dirtywetdogboatsandsailing6805 all the more reason to be hipper vigilant.
I wish that you'd be able to select what gets removed from the vector chart as pat of the settings.. Until then I make sure I make any navigational decisions based on what I see at 1:1 scale and the safety depth is set correctly.