93051 Near Miss Crossing Hong Kong, China

Dangerous Area
- Off Hong Kong, China. Daylight. Fine.
- Report No. 93051.

Own ship, a 4,000 grt container feeder, proceeding from south of Lamma anchorages on a course of 0880 to pass some 0.8' south of Po Toi island and about 1.0' north of the dangerous wrecks. Speed 11 knots with current. The other vessel, a 42,000 grt container vessel, had left Hong Kong, China via the East Lamma channel and was heading approximately as shown on the sketch, and was converging with us on a collision course. Own vessel stood on, waiting for the other vessel to take action. The other vessel was heard to be giving a series of long blasts on her whistle. Course of own ship altered to starboard to parallel other ship. Other ship was contacted on VHF, he just said, "Keep your course and speed". He was advised that he would be reported for contravening the COLREGS. He passed us at some speed about 0.1' on our port side. In the Far East it is common practice for ships to "BLAST" their way through fishing fleets and it appears that this practice is escalating.

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The main point of this report is to highlight the hazards of the area south of Po Toi island. It is a busy area with ships passing in both directions at various distances off the island, this is aggravated by the existence of the dangerous wrecks, local craft and fishing boats. Most ships tend to keep to the east and north of the dangerous wrecks, whereas it is better for southbound ships to keep well to the west of them. Possibly in the above mentioned incident it would have been better for this vessel to have shaped a course passing south of the wrecks.

It is felt that a separation scheme with precautionary area should be introduced with the dangerous wrecks clearly marked by cardinal buoys. The separation scheme in the East Lamma channel should be extended past the Chesterman Rock as outbound ships tend to pass very close to this buoy leaving little room for the deep draughted inbound vessels. In fact, many inbound ships pass to the south of this buoy purely because it is a south cardinal, whereas there is plenty of water for most ships to pass to the north of it