Shipping worries on Banks???

[Any_Weather]

Hi, was just interested to know if anyone has had any incidents with ships while doing overnight ventures to the Barwon Banks or Hards area? I am looking at doing an overnighter on Sunday 30/07 but am a bit concerened about the ships that may pass through the area. I have done numerous evening trips where we are home by midnight but never a full night.I understand keeping a watchful eye on the water at night is extremely important but I really dont want to get too close to these huge beasts and I know how hard it is to judge distances at sea at night. Have any of you guys had much trouble, is a snooze at sea out of the question? Are there many other issues that need to concern me with overnighting in this area.

Thanks
Lee

[Noelm]

not too sure about there particularly, but normaly ships will "go around" known fishing (and by that it can also mean shallow) but I have had a rather spooky experience once down on the NSW South Coast at "our banks", the water is quite shallow there and I was anchored out there on my own (which is rare) and a ship appeared in the distance heading straight for me, nothing unusual there "he will turn off" soon, closer and closer, no sign of a turn, I had a rough guess at the angle and thought he would miss us by a safe margin, gees how wrong was I, when it was really close I realised that he was going to pass REALLY CLOSE, as it went by I coulld hear the engines and a loud radio playing on deack somewhere, not a person (read lookout) to be seen anywhere on the bridge no one on deck, nothing, must say I was rather concerned about that! so I guess in answer to your question, KEEP A LOOKOUT YOURSELF

[finding_time]

Mate you have to keep a lookout anywhere!! I've never seen a ship go over the top of the banks but this doesn't mean it doesn't happen, at tempest we have ship pass all the time and they dont seem the veer away ,it up to you. One night a little wide of tempest we got abused from a ships loud speaker for "daring to fish in a shipping lane" we moved out of the way very early but were a bit slow for the skipper apparently!!!

When offshore i believe its always best to have someone awake and ondeck to keep a lookout it wasn't that long ago that a boat got run down by a long lines returning to mooloolabah on autopilot so it can happen.

Ian

[Hornblower]

Safety first Lee, keep a lookout, it's not just the bog ones you have to worry about either.

Cheers

[seatime]

G'day Any_Weather

You will need to keep a proper lookout if you're going to spend the night out anchored or drifting in areas that are transited by merchant ships.

There has been numerous collisions and contacts between ships and fishing boats, recreational and commercial, in the Barwon Banks area.
Parts of the Barwon Banks lie on a regular track between Cape Moreton and the top of Fraser Is. This shipping route is used by Nth and Sth bound traffic.
Have a look at these for some incident reports:
http://www.atsb.gov.au
http://www.msq.qld.gov.au/qt/msq.nsf..._annual_report

Failure to keep an adequate lookout accounts for the majority of collisions, tho one incident years ago off the Sunny coast was attributed to incorrect light globes and fittings.
Radar reflectors should be compulsory for that type of activity.
If I was staying the night out there or anywhere shipping also uses, I'd have my anchor line ready to detach with a marker bouy at all times.
Don't rely on the ships to see you and alter course, you could be lost in the clutter or not seen at all.
rgds

[Mr__Bean]

As mentioned above get or make yourself a radar reflector and mount it high, unless you are in an ally boat of course. If out in a glass boat you have almost no chance of being seen on their radar.

Sure a lookout is required, but I have been approached by passing ships in the daylight where I have heard them before I have seen them, and boy oh boy they are close when you hear that BM.BM.BM.BM.BM.BM. and then look up to see a ship going past. Lucky they didn't sound their horn as I would have jumped out of my undies for sure.

- Darren

[marlinqld]

Noelm, are you talking about the joseph banks off culburra/greenwell point/jervis bay?

havet been out there for years, family is from tha area and still there.


Mike

[Any_Weather]

Thanks guys for all the response. Yes I am in an alloy boat so hopefully they will see me on radar. I was thinking a watch would be required but just wasnt sure as to how much shipping traffic there would be out there.

Gelsec, mate thanks for that link, very interesting reading.

Finding_time, those long line boats were also a concern as I have seen them travelling over the banks before.

Marlin_Mike, no mate I was talking about the Barwon Banks off Mooloolaba in Queensland.

Thanks again
Lee

[adds31]

Am doing a debut night fish out the banks saturday night. Passing ships did raise a bit of a concern also. One person is always awake on the boat as a safety precaution anyway.

Cheers Adds....

[Cheech]

We were at the Hards 3 weeks ago on a very dark night. Around 3.00am we saw ship lights. The lights looked like the ship was heading straight for us and close as the lights (allround light and port light) were getting further apart whilst at the same time getting higher in the sky. Fortunately we were doing a drift just about to anchour up so had no anchour to worry about. Anyway, as we were moving away, the lights continued to get wider and higher. What the hell was happening?? Was expecting to see the bow wave any second. Eventually we could make out the side of the ship and were clear.

What had happened was that we did not see the ship till it was fairly close to us (maybe as close as a few hundred metres), and passing 100m clear of us, it gave the impression that it was coming straight towards us, but what we were seeing was the allround light and the starbourd light that was positioned near the stern getting wider apart because the distance was getting wider between the 2 lights due to our proximity to the side of the ship. Does that make sense? Just picture complete darkness and only being able to see 2 lights changing position.

Was an anxious couple of minutes whilst we could not work out why we could not get out of the path of the ship.

And this all happened when we were motoring around and working out drifts. ie awake and on deck and looking around. If we were at anchour the chances are that you would not have seen it coming because you do not usually look towards the bow. But if we had seen it, I expect we would have been at the bow and cutting the anchour and hoping like hell we did not get run over.

Not trying to scare anyone. But, you do have to accept a certain amount of risk in being out there at night. You may just get run over and become a statistic.

Cheech

[-spiro-]

stopped out there atleast 10 overnighters and only ever had 1 ship come over the Banks. It was that cruise ship. I have seen a couple come over it durring the day tho.. Make sure someone is always on the look out.....

[SeaSaw]

On top of the event Cheech described (that was fun ), I have had ships come right through the banks a couple of time at night, so definately keep an eye out. That said, we do try and get some sleep, but someone tends to stay on watch and keeps fishing.

Also had to pull the anchor in a hurry one day when a trawler on autopilot and no-one at the helm - everyone was working on the back deck - would have run us over. We didn't actuallly get the anchor fully up, just managed to steam around on it and started heading away. It missed us by about 15m

Cheers,

Mark

[Noelm]

marlin Mike, yes that is the banks I am talking about, i was lucky enough to see it in "the good old days" when it was difficult to find with only landmarks and compass to steer by, no GPS back then, I sort of think WE have all got a bit "soft" these days buy, hey electronics sure makes life easy huh!

[Jeremy]

One night a little wide of tempest we got abused from a ships loud speaker for "daring to fish in a shipping lane"
Ian

Did you moon him? I would have!

Jeremy

[FishOn]

We were anchored up NE of Mooloolaba (about halfway to the Banks), bow south, fishing and looking out towards the NE on a dark night about 3 years ago. We noticed the lights on the coast disappear. Initial thought was that it was a power failure on the coast. Took us a short time realise it was a medium size ship passing not to far from us.

We could not see any lights. They may have had lights but we could not see them at anytime. At the very least their lights were ineffective.

The ship must have approached from the NE (the direction we were facing) but both of us never saw it coming, only saw it when it had passed by. Made us realise again how easy it would be for an accident to occur.

Up goes the radar deflector. Also would not think it prudent to not have a watch.

Thanks for the info on other situations.

Kind regards Trevor