Thursday 30 July

Thursday 30 July
Lat 37*-04'N, Long 045*23'W
Beautiful sailing in about 15kts of wind on the stbd beam. Boat speed is in the high 6's, but alas, we have a contra-currentso the speed over ground is down in the low 5's. But it is still a beautiful day, and we are going nicely towards where we want to go.
Automatic Identification System, or AIS - All ships are required to use the system. It is a radio that every few seconds sends out the ship's name, position, speed, course over ground, etc. Any other ships, or sailboats that are within about 20 miles can now know what that conglomerate of lights is coming over the horizon. What a change it is from the old days when you had no idea if you were in the way or not. We also have the system. The ships out there know that a 36' sailboat named Advent II (so they can call us on the VHF radio) at a certain position, going this fast in that direction. In addition, if the boats are converging, the computer can tell me how close the boats will come and when. It is a beautiful system. We have not seen many ships. A few fishing boats when we first started, now maybe one a day on the AIS but too far to see, and we have seen three. It is real easy to get complacent. Last night about 02:00 I saw a target on the screen, the m/v ERIK OUSSA, a 750' tanker, about 15nm away, headed straight at us. (A ship comes up over the horizon about 10nm away) I started watching it carefully. The calculated Closest Point of Approach, CPA, was .02, .1, .05 nautical miles ahead, the behind, then ahead. It was a true collision situation. At 8 miles I saw his lights, which means he could see ours. At 6 miles I whistled into the VHF microphone to wake up the watchstander. was no change in his course. At 5 miles I called him by name: m/v Erik Oussa, saying I was 5 miles on his bow. I got an immediate response saying he was going to alter course to starboard, to pass one whistle port to port. He did alter course by 10 degrees, and passed 0.7 nm from us, and took up the entire horizon as he went by. Thank you, Keith, for introducing me to this amazing system.
Reef Early
Bill Doar
s/v Advent II
Later, 19:00
Wow! What a ride! Broad reach 6.8 kts right down the line!