View from the Bridge

If you’ve ever thought that pilots aboard commercial vessels are too quick to toot their horns when pleasure craft cross their paths, the video below will help you understand their predicament.

Shot June 3 on San Diego Bay while a well-attended beer can race was going on, it clearly shows how there’s zero visibility for hundreds of feet directly in front of the bow of a big ship, even from its highly elevated bridge.

View from the bridge: "Pass the Rolaids, please." If you’re interested in commercial maritime stuff like this, be sure to check out gCaptain.com, where we first viewed this clip.

As far as we know, no sailboats were plowed under as the 587-ft Dole Ecuador steamed toward its berth. But we wouldn’t be surprised if the pilot who shot the video arrived with a nervous stomach. "People ask me why I’m not crazy about sailboats," he reportedly said.

By the way, if you’re new to sailing we should clarify that all that stuff about starboard vessels having the right of way is irrelevant when it comes to enormous vessels that are constrained by their ability to maneuver through a harbor. To put it in more practical terms, the so-called ‘law of tonnage’ always prevails.