Safety Articles
As the saying goes, ‘know the ropes and you’ll sail a boat, know the buoys and you’ll navigate the sea.’ Jon Mendez, a veteran sailor and boating enthusiast, shares his insights on understanding buoyage to reassure either first-time sailers or seasoned voyagers.
Buoyage is a universal language for seafarers and knowing how to interpret and use it is crucial for safe navigation. Countries typically adopt either inland or coastal systems, with the former usually starting beyond the first sea lock. The coastal systems, however, are further divided into IALA A and B systems. The differentiation lies primarily in the color of the marks, while the shapes generally remain consistent.
High-profile fires have been making ominous waves in the yachting industry. These flame-induced shocks are distressingly commonplace, occurring aboard vessels or in shipyards with worrying regularity. Like the echo of Billy Joel’s hit song, ‘We Didn’t Start the Fire’, these incidents have become a calling card for an industry desperate for immediate safety reforms.
Over the past five years, the world of yachting has been rocked by a series of significant instances of combustion, sparking off severe damages, operational disruptions, and in some cases, complete vessel loss. For instance, the July 2024 inferno at a northern European shipyard mirrors the tragic pattern of the Project Sassi blaze four years earlier. There’s an eerie similarity in these chronicles of fire, with emergency responders battling ceaselessly to reign in the uncontrolled flames.