Please divert your course 15 degrees!

[Jeff Asbury]

This is the transcription of the ACTUAL radio conversation between the
British and the Irish off the coast of Kerry, Ireland October 1998. Radio
conversation released by the Chief of Naval Operations 10-10-98.

IRISH: Please divert your course 15 degrees to the
South to avoid a collision.

BRITISH: Recommend you divert your course 15 degrees
to the North to avoid a collision.

IRISH: Negative. You will have to divert your course
15 degrees to the South to avoid a collision.

BRITISH: This is the Captain of a British Navy Ship. I
say again, divert YOUR course.

IRISH: Negative. I say again, you will have to divert
YOUR course.

BRITISH: THIS IS THE AIRCRAFT CARRIER HMS BRITANNIA! THE SECOND LARGEST
SHIP IN THE BRITISH ATLANTIC FLEET. WE ARE ACCOMPANIED BY THREE
DESTROYERS, THREE CRUISERS AND NUMEROUS SUPPORT VESSELS. DEMAND YOU CHANGE
YOUR COURSE 15 DEGREES NORTH. I SAY AGAIN, THAT
IS 15 DEGREES NORTH OR COUNTER MEASURES WILL BE UNDERTAKEN TO ENSURE THE
SAFETY OF THIS SHIP.

IRISH: We are a lighthouse................Your Call.

 

[Chris Miller]

Powerboats...

Powerboaters... sheesh...
:0305_bigg

 

[NateHanson]

That's a good one. I've always thought it's pretty funny. I just read however that a couple years ago this was picked up in a string of news articles (by apparently very lazy journalists who thought the account about the USS Enterprise was actually true) and the navy had to launch a little PR campaign to debunk it and reassert their navigaitonal prowess. Poor guys.

 

[Tom Metzger]

Snopes has it going back to the sixties. Last week someone sent me a film clip of it.

See http://www.snopes.com/military/lighthse.htm

 

[Jeff Asbury]

Awe, Since it came to me as a e-mail, I thought it had to be true. What a bummer.

 

[NateHanson]

snopes will set you free brother!

 

[HGSail]

Just remember, Aircraft carriers and destroyers are just big Stinkpots. You know, Grand Banks, General Electric, etc........

Pat
E29
#224
Holy Guacamole

 

[soup1438]

Just remember, Aircraft carriers and destroyers are just big Stinkpots. You know, Grand Banks, General Electric, etc........

My brother was in the Navy ("Never Again Volunteer Yourself") for six years as a neutron wrangler and he does the same work now that he's out of the Navy. We joked, before he got married, that his wife would not need a night-light.

So some carriers ain't *direct* stinkpots (burning kerosine to move themselves) though they are still *indirect* stinkpots given how things fly off their decks.

(laughs)

Back to talking about sailing...

Really, for stress relief...

I believe that a major cause of stress is the feeling of "not being in control" of much of our lives, so, by going sailing, it's turned around. Consider, for a moment...

When you are sailing you are bending an elemental force of nature to your will with no more than some rags, rope and a flat blade under the hull.

Admittedly, some of the wakes we get hit with from power-boaters are... ahem... not wonderful, though, I will admit, having your 3 y/o grand-daughter aboard yell out "Do again! Do again!" after riding the roller coaster wake of a big trawler that goes by.