Nav Lights

[djmac]

im not much of a night fisherman, but last saturday night i took a trip out in brisbane water and had a fish around the rip etc.

what i was amazed about was the amount of idiots that didnt have any lights on.

in fact i almost hit some f**kheads in a 12ft tinny.

they had no lights on what so ever

i was only doing 8 knots

and i didnt see them until i was almost on top of them.

i wouldnt have cared as it wouldnt have done anything to my boat, but they would easily be swimming home.

I hope you guys make sure you have some sort of lights on board, even if u hear a boat coming and turn a torch on or even the glow of a mobile phone.

so if you dont have any lights get a clue and get some or you may find yourself going for a dip.

[allen glover]

Its a common as muck occurance on brisbane waters.stuffs up the fishing... apparently bet it was in the rip to boot.

Brisbane waters maritime auth are hopeless IMHO. Just look at the state of the channel marker lights esp at hardies bay narrows for an indication of that. Ive had boats in tow and they have rocketed past me through the no wash zone with no offer to do their job and take over. there quick to hand out tickets for crap like no jackets through box head on a dead flat day though.

Edited February 18, 2005 by allen glover

[Guest Big-Banana]

One morning last year we were coming around Juno Point and it was dark as. We were travelling at a crawl luckily. As were kept coming we were about 10 m away from this bloke when he decided to finally shine a torch to let us know he was there. I would have hated to be him if a boat came flying around as they do and to be hit.

[Ken A]

I used to have problems with unlit boats especially in Cowan. They are damn hard to see in there of a night. The other problem was kayaks /canoes in there , most of them paddled close to the shore & were not a problem but there was always the odd one out wider. I hit one out of Cotton Tree Bay one night coming back from the wreck after an evening jew / snapper session.

Bloody mugs they are. All it takes is to have a lightstick stuck to the boat or a small torch & all the dramas are over for both parties.

My other pet hate is boat owners driving around with spotlights & shining them all over the place or trying to use them like car headlights !

The last one is boats with poorly set up navvy lights that wreck the boat drivers night vision & they can't see a damn thing & almost clean you up whether you are showing an anchor light or not.

The amount of times I nearly got run over in Pittwater at night when I was using an overhead flouro was amazing. The boat was brightly lit from a LARGE overhead fluoro which helped with the squidding / fishing & was easily visible from a kilometer away & still had close calls