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The article is incorrect about the obsolescence of lighthouses. GPS is an adjunct to navaids and charting, particularly when near shore. Some small boats won't

by wbl 4y ago

The article is incorrect about the obsolescence of lighthouses. GPS is an adjunct to navaids and charting, particularly when near shore. Some small boats won't have a chart plotter. You don't want electrical problem to become a navigational issue also.

gabereiser 4y ago
Exactly. Fancy electronics are secondary to the Mark I Eyeball. Lighthouses are still incredibly useful in low visibility situations such as heavy fog.
- sandworm101 4y ago
  So which do you go with when they disagree? If your eyeball sees a landmark that you believe puts you at point X, but the GPS says you are at point Y, which do you believe? For me, absent any other facts, I default to trusting the instrument over the human. I think the risk that the is human misidentifying a landmark is greater than the risk that a ship's GPS is malfunctioning. Again, absent any knowledge of hacking/spoofing in the area.
  - gabereiser 4y ago
    If it’s a matter of a landmark, I trust GPS. If it’s a matter of where the rocks and shoals are, I trust a human. From the cockpit you can only see what’s above the waterline. Currents and seas can shift sand bars and reefs. For that you need a person on the bow.
can16358p 4y ago
But doesn't virtually anyone have a smartphone now? A phone + powerbank should suffice. And most likely there would be additional people on board in case someone's phone stops working (e.g. dropped into the sea). And if I were to navigate in a foggy/stormy day by myself, I'd at least carry an additional phone. And if there was so much fog that would affect GPS signals, how can lighthouse lights be seen anyway? I'm not a sailor or anything, just trying to understand why this can't be done and why lighthouses are still needed.
- throwaway0a5e 4y ago
  There are a lot of sea states and weather conditions in which it's inappropriate and somewhat futile to whip out a smart phone on anything that doesn't have a fully enclosed bridge. Marker buoys are your friend in those situations.
- TameAntelope 4y ago
  And what signal to download the updated weather data?
  - can16358p 4y ago
    Your comment is completely irrelevant to my comment as I'm not commenting anything related to getting weather data.
    - TameAntelope 4y ago
      Then your comment is incomplete! You would need accurate weather data to use your cell phone successfully to navigate in the night time during weather where a lighthouse is of most importance.
- _moof 4y ago
  Fog doesn't affect GPS. GPS is just not 100% reliable (ask me how I know) or necessarily even the best navaid for every situation. Even aircraft go visual for the last few hundred feet. (Or if they're doing autoland, it's with a purpose-built ground-based system, not GPS.) Speaking more generally it's just very risky to put all your eggs into one basket when it comes to navigation. It's so difficult to impress upon the new generation of navigators that they are guaranteed to be completely screwed at least once in their lives if they don't learn something other than GPS.
  - mortenlarsen 4y ago
    > GPS is just not 100% reliable (ask me how I know) How to you know?
sccxy 4y ago
lighthouse != all kind of physical navigation aids Lightvessels, classical big lighthouses are obsolescence. There are a lot of other physical navigation aids which are improved. Old unlit marks are replaced with lit and AIS capable ones. New safe waterways and danger areas are marked every year. Nobody said these are obsolete.
- Ekaros 4y ago
  Lighted buoys and sector lights are still common and useful aids for navigation, both in dark and light. And you really don't some times go outside those specially with deeper drafts.
- sandworm101 4y ago
  >> classical big lighthouses are obsolescence. Nope. To see something in daylight it needs to be big. That big white pole is visible for miles and identifies the location in exactly the same way as the light does at night. Towers guided ships long before anyone started putting lights on them.
  - sccxy 4y ago
    Nope. For that there are daymarks. [1] Clover Island Light (2010) is the first lighthouse to be built in the United States since 1962. [2] If they are not obsolescence why they have built only one lighthouse in last 50 years in USA? [1]: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Daymark https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Daymark [2]: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Clover_Island_Light https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Clover_Island_Light
traceroute66 4y ago
> GPS is an adjunct to navaids and charting. Indeed. For all the millennial kids on here, there's a famous American Airlines lecture called "Children of the Magenta Line", it's doing the rounds on YouTube[1]. Boaters should adopt the same mentality. [1]https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WITLR_qSPXk https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WITLR_qSPXk
sandworm101 4y ago
>> GPS is an adjunct to navaids and charting Maybe 15 years ago. Today, GPS is the primary and charting comes slower/later to confirm positions. GPS isn't done intermittently. It is just on 24/7. Then occasionally (on the order of minutes to hours) a ship's position is confirmed by other means if possible. Near land the crew will sight landmarks to confirm the GPS track is accurate. But go onboard a ship in bad weather at night. You won't see the captain out there with a sextant trying to track stars. The GPS is basically it until there is good reason to second guess or confirm its accuracy. If the GPS fails, the ship's insurer might just tell the ship to hold position until it gets fixed. Ships are not planes. They can actually stay away from land/danger for days/weeks while repairs happen.

by wbl 4y ago

gabereiser 4y ago

Exactly. Fancy electronics are secondary to the Mark I Eyeball. Lighthouses are still incredibly useful in low visibility situations such as heavy fog.

sandworm101 4y ago
So which do you go with when they disagree? If your eyeball sees a landmark that you believe puts you at point X, but the GPS says you are at point Y, which do you believe? For me, absent any other facts, I default to trusting the instrument over the human. I think the risk that the is human misidentifying a landmark is greater than the risk that a ship's GPS is malfunctioning. Again, absent any knowledge of hacking/spoofing in the area.
- gabereiser 4y ago
  If it’s a matter of a landmark, I trust GPS. If it’s a matter of where the rocks and shoals are, I trust a human. From the cockpit you can only see what’s above the waterline. Currents and seas can shift sand bars and reefs. For that you need a person on the bow.

can16358p 4y ago

But doesn't virtually anyone have a smartphone now? A phone + powerbank should suffice. And most likely there would be additional people on board in case someone's phone stops working (e.g. dropped into the sea). And if I were to navigate in a foggy/stormy day by myself, I'd at least carry an additional phone. And if there was so much fog that would affect GPS signals, how can lighthouse lights be seen anyway? I'm not a sailor or anything, just trying to understand why this can't be done and why lighthouses are still needed.

throwaway0a5e 4y ago
There are a lot of sea states and weather conditions in which it's inappropriate and somewhat futile to whip out a smart phone on anything that doesn't have a fully enclosed bridge. Marker buoys are your friend in those situations.
TameAntelope 4y ago
And what signal to download the updated weather data?
- can16358p 4y ago
  Your comment is completely irrelevant to my comment as I'm not commenting anything related to getting weather data.
  - TameAntelope 4y ago
    Then your comment is incomplete! You would need accurate weather data to use your cell phone successfully to navigate in the night time during weather where a lighthouse is of most importance.
_moof 4y ago
Fog doesn't affect GPS. GPS is just not 100% reliable (ask me how I know) or necessarily even the best navaid for every situation. Even aircraft go visual for the last few hundred feet. (Or if they're doing autoland, it's with a purpose-built ground-based system, not GPS.) Speaking more generally it's just very risky to put all your eggs into one basket when it comes to navigation. It's so difficult to impress upon the new generation of navigators that they are guaranteed to be completely screwed at least once in their lives if they don't learn something other than GPS.
- mortenlarsen 4y ago
  > GPS is just not 100% reliable (ask me how I know) How to you know?

sccxy 4y ago

lighthouse != all kind of physical navigation aids Lightvessels, classical big lighthouses are obsolescence. There are a lot of other physical navigation aids which are improved. Old unlit marks are replaced with lit and AIS capable ones. New safe waterways and danger areas are marked every year. Nobody said these are obsolete.

Ekaros 4y ago
Lighted buoys and sector lights are still common and useful aids for navigation, both in dark and light. And you really don't some times go outside those specially with deeper drafts.
sandworm101 4y ago
>> classical big lighthouses are obsolescence. Nope. To see something in daylight it needs to be big. That big white pole is visible for miles and identifies the location in exactly the same way as the light does at night. Towers guided ships long before anyone started putting lights on them.
- sccxy 4y ago
  Nope. For that there are daymarks. [1] Clover Island Light (2010) is the first lighthouse to be built in the United States since 1962. [2] If they are not obsolescence why they have built only one lighthouse in last 50 years in USA? [1]: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Daymark https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Daymark [2]: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Clover_Island_Light https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Clover_Island_Light

traceroute66 4y ago

> GPS is an adjunct to navaids and charting. Indeed. For all the millennial kids on here, there's a famous American Airlines lecture called "Children of the Magenta Line", it's doing the rounds on YouTube[1]. Boaters should adopt the same mentality. [1]https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WITLR_qSPXk https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WITLR_qSPXk

sandworm101 4y ago

>> GPS is an adjunct to navaids and charting Maybe 15 years ago. Today, GPS is the primary and charting comes slower/later to confirm positions. GPS isn't done intermittently. It is just on 24/7. Then occasionally (on the order of minutes to hours) a ship's position is confirmed by other means if possible. Near land the crew will sight landmarks to confirm the GPS track is accurate. But go onboard a ship in bad weather at night. You won't see the captain out there with a sextant trying to track stars. The GPS is basically it until there is good reason to second guess or confirm its accuracy. If the GPS fails, the ship's insurer might just tell the ship to hold position until it gets fixed. Ships are not planes. They can actually stay away from land/danger for days/weeks while repairs happen.