Collision with Freighter averted with L1D

Well, that may be a bit of hyperbole. Anyway, last month I was crew on a boat racing from St. Petersburg, FL to Isla de Mujeres, Mexico. I was brought on as the sail trim expert, but little did they know the collection of lights that would accompany me. One of the crew, who goes by "Stiffler" (don't ask) did not arrive fully prepared with an adequate personal lighting tool, so I outfitted him with a Fenix L1D - which left him pretty stoked, of course. The third night out, he was on watch with the skipper of the boat, when they noted a large commercial ship closing with our course. They contacted him on the VHF to coordinate collision avoidance, but the freighter's helmsman could not see the boat at that distance despite our having legal navigation lights and a radar reflector. Stiffler pulled out the L1D and fired it up, prompting an immediate "I see you now!" from the freighter.

Our boat's skipper was suitably impressed, and once back ashore was anxious to learn more about high quality lighting. As a gift to the boat, I left the skipper with the L1D and a Streamlight Survivor LED. He was very appreciative.

Very cool!!

Excellent, amazing how a low cost tool can make such a huge difference.

I once was a passenger on a 72' private yacht in the Long Island sound. It was on autopilot. the boat started veering off towards the shore for no apparent reason, we kept turning off the AP, the retrying. No help, still wanted to beach itself, until the owner noticed a flashlight with a magnetic base sitting near the compass that controls the AP!

That flashlight found a new home on the bottom of the L.I. sound.

Fenix L series kicks ***!

Nice story. Here you can see how a small flaslight could save lives.

rayman

Great light, great story

Good story. :twothumbs I like happy endings. We'll enlighten the population one freighter at a time!

Nuggett, how long ago was that? I'd assume large vessels now have more than a magnetic compass for autopilot... GPS and such... but I really don't know being a landlubber.

this was in the olden days of 1971....no GPS, cell phones, computers, you know, the stone age!

That was a very cool short story. Thanks for sharing it.

A light is a tool ...we realize that,outsiders don't...until they are enlightened.Great story,way to save the day...who knows if you weren't asked to sail.:candle:

That story about the magnetic flashlight incident
reminds me of an episode of " Mr. Lucky ",
a television series, which ran from 1959 - 1960.


Bad Guy had a fancy yacht.

Good Guy places a couple " small, decorative magnetic cats " near ship's compass.


Navigation subsequently goes awry.


Amazing i can still recall, since i was only 6 or 7 years old.



Anybody else ? ? ?

:wave:
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