Seriously? SERIOUSLY!!! Pay for it??
Firstly, I’m not the one having a legal issue.
Secondly, opinions are like a$$holes - everybody has one.
Thirdly, without any legal or scholarly justification, one’s opinion has no validity. Including mine.
Fourthly, there are a lot of attorneys offering legal opinions in the media. Yes, they are being paid by the network to opine, but their opinion on legal maters is just that: OPINION, not ADVICE!!!
Lastly: If you critically read my post, the operative word was “comment”, not advice.
So with my 23 years as a deck officer in the industry, all on deep-sea vessels, some years as master, all with no groundings, collisions, and more than one “oh sh!t-we were lucky”, I made my original comment.
Some contributors to this issue have evaded the question of “propelled by machinery” by diverting the conversation to intent - vis a vie “running with engine and sail, and just before collision, turning off engine”. Others have stated emphatically either that running the engine in neutral is a vessel under power, is is not under power until the propeller is turning. Who is correct??
At least Kennebec_Captain, in his most recent post, made an attempt to provide some justification.