PK's sailing posts: Drina's latest Position Report: Time 1800UTC, Monday 2010-12-13, wind East 05 knots, position 43°05W 149°26W, miles to go 3236 and hove too.

Tuesday, December 14, 2010

Drina's latest Position Report: Time 1800UTC, Monday 2010-12-13, wind East 05 knots, position 43°05W 149°26W, miles to go 3236 and hove too.

More news from Drina,

The mystery of the reports not being in sync with the time-frame required by the tracking station is ongoing... Watch this space, I was promised a fix by Monday and here we are Tuesday and ....

So once again I'll post the mail mostly as received with a small number of personal redactions that will make no difference to you lot. However I've been asked to add a few explanatory remarks by one or two on the list so here goes...

GRIB files are digitized weather maps scanned and transmitted by a network of voluntary Ham HF radio stations around the world for the use of small ships at sea. (think Facsimile machine) Once received onboard Drina they can be layered onto the mapping software on the laptop and display a weather map at the location of the ship.

Sailmail is a similar network of voluntary Ham HF radio stations, however this group provide a messaging service similar to SMS on your mobile phone. The length of the message is limited, ASCII characters only are allowed, no attachments and messages with pictures or other format enhancements will be rejected. The key difference is that it operates on a schedule and is not therefore real time, there is a delay between transmission and receipt.

UTC Coordinated Universal Time, (why it's not Universal Time Coordinated is subject of another mail) it's not the same as Greenwich Mean Time, GMT the solar time at the Greenwich Meridian or 000°Longitude. However, for our purposes and everyone else I can think of except atomic scientists it's the same thing. Sometimes referred to as Zulu in radio transmissions for clarity.

The Anti meridian or date line is longitude 180° On this line the date is different by a day on either side. Tuesday at 179°W and Wednesday at 179°E. While at sea the time changes on board by one hour for every 15° of longitude traveled east or west of the line. This is referred to as ships time. More importantly it relates to Sun time so the crew can sort out the watches and I don't mean wrist watches...

All that said here's the mail...

Dear Kerro,

We got headed with light easterly winds last night so hove to for the night at 2100 ships time and
now it's Monday at 1800UTC and we are still just hove too. In very light Eastly winds
The grib-files show no relief for two days 'till the slow moving low passes over us and we
may get 50Kts plus onthe back off it from south.

According to the NZ weather file you sent me we are in the middle off a ridge off gale force winds, not so!

Alex asleep, so I'm able to steal some time on the computer, she was up late at night for three hours and more doing Sailmail when the reception is better, she has been using Nui.

I suspect we could be in for some days of very slow progress, when the next high catches us, as it is
way further south then it should be. Unfortunately the lows are too much north at present, it is all
a bit screwed. Had a email from Pat in Tassi and he says the weather all very screwed down there.
So does not look a good season for this late in the year.

Time 1800UTC, Monday 2010-12-13, wind East 05 knots, position 43°05W 149°26W, miles to go 3236 and hove too.

Will motor a bit later to run fridge otherwise drift and waiting a change.

rgs Michael

Paul Kerrigan

Strewth on Bathurst Hbr