VTS Harwich
25 May 2016 | Queenborough, Riveer Swale
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Some of the screens in the control room at Harwich VTS with a 400 meter container ship in the background - to big for the Panama Canal!
Jane was our host last Sunday for the traditional English early supper. She is also a Bar Pilot at the Harwich / Felixstove port, one of the busiest container and shipping ports in the UK.
We met up with her for lunch at an old traditional Pub on Tuesday in Harwich, where she had arranged a tour for us the Harwich VTS (Vessel Traffic Control). This is not unlike a control tower at a busy airport.
They not only control traffic coming in and out of port, dispatches pilots and keep an eye on local movements, but also direct ships in and out of one of the 'roundabout' traffic separation zones off shore. There are 2 controllers each handling his own zone and a duty officer overseeing it all. There must have been a total of 12 or 15 big computer screens feeding radar, AIS, currents and God knows what else info, boards of expected traffic and a constant chat on several VHF radio feeds. They even tracked Tivoli on her movement downriver from Ipswich to a transient dock, AND had her picture up on one of the screens when we walked in. They gave us a few tips on any short cuts getting on towards London.
Today we did get to the mouth of the Thames River and are hanging on a mooring waiting to go up river tomorrow morning. Playing the tides/currents we did the 53 NM trip in a little over 7 hours.
A little talk about trip planning in UK waters.............the Brits are used to it but it takes us a while to do our planning.
Last night we probably spend 2 hours with the tide books for Harwich, Dover and Shearness, then used the tables in the Almanac to figure out when the current would be best for going towards London. We also had to take into account how to get out of the River Orwell with good current. Oh, and to get into the River Medway without fighting adverse water!
Then onto the real planning, as there are a bunch of sandbanks and fairly narrow channels as much as 30 Miles off the coast. As it turned out, there were 4 choices for us going from Harwich to Quensboro. The inside lane did not have enough water for our keel, the outside was too long, the left middle was supposed to have a bunch of traffic so we picked lane # 2. The on to creating the 16 waypoints to string the trip together, double check that it did not cross any obstructions or shallows.........
As it turned out, it was a nice trip in limited visibility, light drizzle but relatively flat water and 12 - 15 knots of reaching breeze, enough to propel us along at 6 - 9 knots. The view and smell of sandbanks along the route was quite strange, and with the fog made it almost surreal............