This is the statement from the SW Alaska Pilot from another thread. Anchoring in open waters in the Gulf of Alaska is at best imprudent, and at worst negligent, given the unpredictable environmental conditions which may be encountered at any time of the year.” In a sense it is literally true th…

[image] tugsailor: It could be that the typical foreign tanker captain simply thinks: “I anchor off Fujairah all the time, so I can anchor off here too.” Not all foreign (I.e. non-American) Masters think alike. PS> Fujairah Anchorage is known to experience heavy squalls with little warning.

I’m not familiar with that area. But the pilot was not talking about just that area. He says there is no place anywhere in the Gulf of Alaska where a ship can anchor in open waters because of the unpredictable environmental conditions. I didn’t really make it clear but the point I was trying to…

In North America weather generally moves west to east. I always thought West Coast weather more unpredictable than East Coast weather for this reason, on this side of the country the weather crosses vastly more reporting points than it does over on the other side. When I taught my flight students w…

The NTSB investigating the Seacor lift boat said it capsized due to a squall that overtook it. The duck boat sinking was due to a squall. If it happens in “sheltered” places like these, why not in the ocean? I’ve been in sudden squalls in the GOA, this year even. That chance in the GOA is a VERY…

Squalls happen all over the world, in open waters, at sheltered anchorages and over land. To be hit by a squall while sailing in open waters can be dangerous, especially for small ships/boats, ships in bad condition, or not being made properly seaworthy. In Singapore we have a phenomena known as “…

[image] freighterman1: The weather in the GOA is predictable in the sense that is always unpredictable. But the unpredictability is often a result of a skipper’s mind frame and tide. I agree, the words predictable / unpredictable are somewhat vague. More precise to say that a ship anchored in…

Here’s some guidance from the Coast Pilot wrt to some wind speeds that are considered a risk. [Anchor_WX] They’ve picked a gale and a storm as critical wind speeds. These numbers are too high for a PCTC/PCC. According to the internet a 200 meter car ship has twice the windage (sail area) as a VLC…

[image] freighterman1: I am uncertain as to whether NOAA takes into account the state of the tide when predicting wave heights, or if they use just wind as a predictor. They take into account tide factors on the pinpoint forecast with the MapClick feature but not for the general area forecast…

Back when WBH29 ( Peggy Dyson) in Kodiak gave the high seas forecast daily on 4125 Khz it of coarse was from the National Marine Wx Service predictions. Listening to the Vessels checking in with WX observations I was often amazed at how different actual conditions were from predicted. I suppose tha…

IIRC my previous employer hired a well known firm to model the impact of wave patterns in the Gulf of Alaska on the structural integrity of our charted high tensile strength steel tankers (which kept cracking). They had to put in the program patterns that existed no where else in the world.

Is the Marine Weather in Alaska really Unpredictable?

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Is the Marine Weather in Alaska really Unpredictable?

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