Collision in/near Venezuelan waters

Discussion in 'Boat Design' started by kerosene, Apr 6, 2020.

  1. kerosene
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    kerosene Senior Member

  2. kerosene
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    Location: finland

    kerosene Senior Member

  3. kerosene
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    kerosene Senior Member

    "Venezuelan officials have said that they cannot rule out that Resolute was "was transporting mercenaries to attack military bases in Venezuela," but it is unclear if this was why they had sortied out the Naiguatá to investigate the cruise ship in the first place. The Resolute was sailing from Buenos Aires, Argentina to Willemstad at the time and was officially carrying no passengers. "

    Ok. with that tone my detector says the link I posted is probably quite accurate.

    couple of links

    Venezuelan Navy Ship Sinks After Collision with Expedition Cruise Ship – gCaptain https://gcaptain.com/venezuelan-navy-ship-sinks-after-collision-with-expedition-cruise-ship/

    Video Emerges Of Venezuelan Navy Ship Firing On And Colliding With Cruise Ship Before Sinking https://www.thedrive.com/the-war-zone/32893/video-emerges-of-venezuelan-navy-ship-firing-on-and-colliding-with-cruise-ship-before-sinking
     
  4. Squidly-Diddly
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    Squidly-Diddly Senior Member

    questions:

    Who is still taking cruises on cruise ships???

    If no passengers, why was this weird cruise 1 mile outside waters of oil rich nation that (during the Bat Virus Crisis no less) US Sec of State makes a big issue about doing "regime change" on?

    Any reason not to believe the Ven Govt's claim its mission was to drop spies and commandos along the coast in small boats?

    If there was lots of "stuff" going on about unpaid bills and unclear who legally owns the boat, last thing I'd tell the captain is to go anywhere near any impoverished unstable nation's waters.

    Anyways, looks like the ship may have pulled an excellent move on the boat. Boat was going to try to push ship's bow over (dumb regardless) so when ship sees this collision coming first instinct will always be "emergency stop!". What happened, it seems, is of course didn't stop in time, but....may have slowed just enough to allow boat to cross its bow and boat now takes ship's bow to boat's midships. Just like in Top Gun when Maverick hits the airbrake to allow boogy to fly past and into his sights! :)

    I heard somewhere that on the high seas any Govt ship could board any civilian ship (no "Freedom of the Seas" for civilians) on weak pretext. They might not have any rights to impound a civilian ship on high seas, but the civilian ship was required to stop, and that was something all Govts agreed on. Sorta like you gotta stop for a cop, regardless, THEN maybe argue in court later.
     
  5. kapnD
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    kapnD Senior Member

    Read the report, the cruises ship was dead in the water for engine maintenance when the warship approached, fired on them, then attempted to push the bow to head it into Venezuelan waters.
    Cruise ship had only small crew aboard, no passengers.
    Very aggressive maneuvers, not well thought out!
     
  6. Squidly-Diddly
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    Squidly-Diddly Senior Member

    How did they go from "dead in the water for engine maintenance" to ramming another amidships good enough to instantly sink it?

    From my exp with cars, " for engine maintenance" would mean even more time lag to get up speed from dead stop. I don't have any exp with big ship engines, but seems like an odd place to do pit stop when sailing from Argentina to Germany....13 miles off coast of uninhabited island of nation is unfriendly with.

    I'm guessing what really happened is ship was ordered to heave to and prepare to be boarded for inspection, ship refused and kept going heading for international waters, boat fired across bow, ship kept going, by that time it was iffy if they were still in territorial waters so boat captain thinks "If I fire on this ship and put a real hole in her and their fancy gear proves it happened in international waters, and we don't find any spies and spy gear, I'll be in deep doo-doo....so I'll push her bow over to prevent her running away".

    To me real question is "does it make any sense that this ship was in that location in the first place?" Do empty cruise ships on return voyages normally go several hundred miles off course just so the skeleton crew can do some long distance sight seeing? US Govt is obsessed with Venezuela for some reason, running itself ragged trying to invent some excuse to "take action". For Venezuelan navy to do something blatantly illegal in international waters would fit the bill, so maybe attempt to goad them into doing so? Maybe their own innate incompetence saved them. lol.
     
  7. kapnD
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    kapnD Senior Member

    Cruise ships do a lot of weird maneuvers, often designed to keep them in calm waters while killing time till next scheduled port stop. With the Coronavirus situation, they probably have nowhere to park, so killing time wherever it’s convenient?
    Details are sketchy, who knows what really happened?
    Sounds like the basis for a good novel!
     
  8. Squidly-Diddly
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    Squidly-Diddly Senior Member

    Yeah, but this was supposedly an empty ship en route to Germany. Sure seems funny place to park. Maybe they already dropped the spies, and were waiting to pick them back up! Now spies are stranded either on mainland or island!

    Bringing it back to Boat Design, maybe now would be a good time to figure out a generalized kit for converting cruise ships into hospital/quarantine ships. Like how they make temp clean rooms, with HVAC that works off existing systems.

    I imagine the entire cruise industry is caught between "I guess now would be great time to catch up on remodeling and maintenance, without any pressure to pay overtime" and "its ALL OVER!, should we sellout before price of scrap iron drops?!?!"

    Some insane Oakland city council woman wanted to use a cruise ship for homeless (this was before Bat Virus no less, when cruise ships cost money). But what about converting cruise ship to "market rate" housing or hotel space? This seems to work, long term no less. Never been on one, except lunch on Queen Mary hotel ship as little kid, but today's CRUISE ships must have much more non-cabin space than old passenger liners like Queen Mary. The Queen Mary™ - One-Of-A-Kind Long Beach Hotel Experience https://www.queenmary.com/
     
  9. jehardiman
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    jehardiman Senior Member

    No, forcibly boarding a foreign flagged vessel without express permission from the flag state in international waters is an act of war/piracy depending on your point of view. EEZs don't count; ask all the USCG cutters that have chased Chinese/Taiwanese/Korean fishing boats all the way back to their territorial waters. Remember the Tuna War and the Cod War, they killed people playing bumper cars.

    Here is video from NAIGUATA (assumed to be suitably edited) CNW on Twitter https://twitter.com/ConflictsW/status/1246520629760843780
    Anyway, based on the video and of damage to RCGS RESOLUTE’s bow and the respective height of NAIGUATA's bow, looks like he holed himself in way of the house after getting rolled and trapped under the ice strengthened bow.
    More info here: Rcgs Resolute - Passenger ship, IMO 9000168, MMSI 255806208, Callsign CQAL6, Flag Portugal - vesseltracker.com https://www.vesseltracker.com/en/Ships/Rcgs-Resolute-9000168.html
    FWIW in the lee of La Tortuga looks like the perfect place to shelter while doing maintenance.
     
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  10. BlueBell
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    BlueBell . . . _ _ _ . . . _ _ _

    And nobody got hurt.
    Funny story though.
    Reminds me of when a little import tries to cut off a semi...
     
  11. JT2017
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    JT2017 New Member

    Thanks for sharing
     
  12. DogCavalry
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    DogCavalry Senior Member

    Sorry, but the notion of using a cruise ship to drop off or pick up spies is simply laughable. Drop off where? What cruise ship capable port? Pick up? Like with a gaff, out of the water?

    Almost any other ship afloat would be a better choice. Like something small and unobtrusive.
     
  13. kapnD
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    kapnD Senior Member

    If the circumstances had anything to do with US Special Forces, we all know who’s calling the shots there, and nothing would surprise me!
     
  14. DogCavalry
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    DogCavalry Senior Member

    Just looked up the Convention on the High Seas (Geneva 1958).

    The Venezuelan navy boat was trying to commit an act of piracy. They had absolutely zero legal right to mess with that cruise ship. They only could board if they knew the cruise ship was transporting slaves to market, or it was itself engaged in piracy, or it was under a Venezuelan flag. So it's just another case of incompetent pirates sinking.

    Metaphorically speaking, for my Southern neighbors, it's not like New Mexico state troopers trying to search a car a mile inside Texas, it's like Mexican Federales trying to search a Texans car in Canada.

    And for some reason, the Texan doesn't knuckle under.
     

  15. kapnD
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    kapnD Senior Member

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