Reading about Reefmaster and crew stumbling onto the upturned cat floating aimlessly around the high seas has got me thinking about the potential hazards that may be out there.
So a couple of questions.
1.What potential hazards have been seen floating around?.
2.Has anybody sustained any boat damage from hitting any floating objects?.
3.Knowing that there is this potential danger how many of us still drive around the sea at night?
Interested to hear any thoughts on the subject.
cheers Scott
I believe some people died a few years ago in
Moreton Bay after striking a 20ft or 40ft shpping container that was floating 2ft under water.
I nearly hit a floating dead turtle at Xmas time at Inskip point.
Seen a crap load of logs floating around the mouth of the Logan river and down through the Jumpinpin.
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Show me the Snapper!
I have seen a container floating out near the shelf, and the best/worse one was something like a telegraph pole about 8 metres long and about 2 foot diametre just "bobbing" at surface level, also out near the shelf, saw a pack of decking timber once as well, but it was floating quite high, i towed it for a while (thinking about a new deck at home) then got sick of it and called the local Authorities to take care of it.
old bloke i worked with a few years ago was a very keen yachty, he was telling me how he needed a change of undies one morning out off moreton when a submarine surfaced not too far away. not a damage story but certainly not something you'd want to run into.
Silver rope
Hi Guys
On Monday ran over and caught, on one prop, a short length of discared 12 or 14 mm silver rope not far short of the seaway entrance during a runout tide. :mad: Its good to have a spare motor sometimes!
I wish people would not leave their rubbish in the water for other people to clean up or worse.
Not nice to lose a motor just before going thru a bar even if its only the GC Seaway
On a different tack, while water skiing in the Murray River upstream from Mildura during the floods there (73 74) we learnt that red gum sleepers, washed out of the forest, float several inches below the surface, not nice; and we also learned that while swimming across rivers snakes don't like to get caught on skiers legs and neither do the skiers like it much either!
Cheers
Chimo
Last edited by Chimo; 19-01-2007 at 08:21 AM.
What could go wrong.......................
My son is in the Navy and was previously on the supply ship "Westralia" One of the tasks these lads had was to shoot the bejesus out of floating containers identified at sea by the fighting ships. Apparently it is a regular occurrence.
.... we know they are out there
and there is not much of a dead cow floating above the water in Somerset dam..not nice when you are skiing..stops ya real quick.Originally Posted by Chimo
Hit a log in the Logan and snapped the motor straight off the back
Nearly put some the kids on a couple of biscuits onto a dead shark floating in the Richmond at Woodburn Oops
Didn't hit it in the boat but my little brother climbed up onto a new rock at Boatharbour on the Wilson near Lismore and the thing blow up on him..and he fell into it.... It was really a dead, bloated cow that the flood brought down
I was on a jet ski in new zealand, with my wife on the back, we were going flat out when all of a sudden we were both in the air heading for the water at great speed. When we got our senses back to us we swam back to the jet ski and found we had run into a huge wooden power pole. The jet ski had little damage luckily, we got out of it with bad bruising and twisted linbs. Id had to see the bamage if we hit it in a boat!!
A long time ago traveling at night we hit something with colour, left a mark on the white hull with no damage and ruined the outboard leg on the spot. Never did find out what it actually was but it was harder than aluminium and a light blue/grey in colour.
In the past I have spotted stuff to my port or starboard at night but only when at almost 90deg to it, would certainly be too late- very spooky.
cheers fnq
Some interesting stories there,and a couple that I would prefer not to dwell to much on(finga and pinhead,the dead cow stories almost made me have a second veiwing of my undigested fish and chip dinner.)
Logs and flood debris seem to be a common sighting,need to take care particularly after rain periods.
Submarine,well we all heard about that rapid ascent by the us navy sub and the tragic consequences for the jap reseach ship off Hawaii a couple of years ago.
I really thought that encounters with shipping containers were a bit of an urban legend,but it seems to be quite common.
I'm particularly impressed by your effort Noelm.How long did it take before you realised the futility of towing such a dead weight all the way back home.I would have been tempted with the lure of a free deck as well.
I also encountered a turtle recently which kept trying to submerge but kept popping back to the surface.I assumed it had been hit by a boat and I was quite saddened to see its fruitless attempts.
There does seem to be quite a lot of crap floating around waiting to cause harm to the unwary mariner and his vessel.
Some of it is caused by nature or by accident and some, hey Chimo, is discarded by thoughtless slobs .
Cheers Scott
the only thing I have ever hit was years ago after a flood in Newcastle. I was going out via the houbour and hit a log and got airborn, after I landed dropped the motor back down and off I went without any damage
Never had any damage, but did find this when out with a mate. His boat is 6.0mt long so that make the log about 8mt
Was floating out in front of woongoolga creek off fraser island right in the path of the barge
Cheers
Mark
There is an amazing website that lists all sorts of cargo mishaps and shipping disasters.
I have read somewhere on that site that there are approximately 900+ shipping containers lost overboard from container ships annually. A lot of them float too.
http://cargolaw.com/
WARNING - That website will consume many hours of your time browsing throught the disasters. You have been warned........
Sea-Dog
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