ELECTRONICS
Bump In The Night
INTERPHASE LOOK-AHEAD SONAR CAN BE A
LIFESAVER
Maritime New Zealand
STORY BY PETER SWANSON
he Nordhavn 46 Stargazer was chugging along
happily, one in a fleet of 12 trawlers stretched over five
miles of the North Atlantic Ocean. The date was June 3,
2004, and the boats of the Nordhavn Atlantic Rally had
1,200 miles of blue water to cross before making landfall
in the Azores. The watch-stander on Stargazer was the
first to note the anomaly. At 4:3 0 a.m. he saw a ghost.
I was on watch, too, aboard Nordhavn’s rally flagship
T
Atlantic Escort. The VHF call from Stargazer warned
us that “another boat” was moving through the group,
possibly being overtaken. He had counted radar returns
and saw there were 12. Since the radar doesn’t show its
own boat, that was one too many. The phantom return
was constant but faint. Like the rest of the watch-standers I
began studying my screen for any vessel not conforming to
the fleet’s present speed of 6. 9 knots and 92-degree course.
