T&T: rules of navigation..sail vs power

badornato adornato@gmail.com
Sun Apr 1 23:26:45 EDT 2007


today on san francisco bay it was blowing about 20-25kts, the usual
for this time of year. I was taking a group of college kids on a lunch
cruise in my Krogen 42.
as i chugged north under the sf bay bridge at the usual 7.5 kts, i saw
a beautiful old Swan 44 (sailboat) under full main and #1 jib crossing
slowing in front of me from port to starboard. Seeing a collision
course, i pulled back the throttle to idle and let him pass before me,
feeling good about my power-sail manners.
He then tacked over to starboard and trailed me on a parallel course,
catching me and coming within one boatlength right alongside.  With
every gust of wind he rounded up a little and got closer, till I
decided that was pretty dangerous and i altered my course 90 degrees
to port to give him room. Then i proceeded north again.
Ten minutes later there he was again overtaking me on my starboard and
crowding up again within one boatlength.  By this time we were in the
main bay, and it was gusting harder.

My choice was to bear off again and give him space or.......what i did
was get out of the pilothouse and yell "if you round up you are going
to hit me".
and he bore off away and gave me space.

My question is:  does an overtaking sailboat have to give way to a powerboat?

if he had been racing i would have moved out of his way.  i thought he
 was inexperienced, overcanvassed and oblivious to the consequences of
rounding up his pointy bow into my beautiful new awlgrip.

-- 
bruce adornato


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