200213 Unlit Fishing Boats

Unlit Fishing Boats
Report No. 200213

Fishing boats in the China Sea have a very bad habit of operating without lights. One of our vessels encountered an unlit fishing vessel at night in rough seas. The fishing vessel remained unlit until our vessel was almost on top of her before they turned on their lights. In the rough weather the fishing vessel was not spotted in the sea clutter. Drastic action was taken to avoid a serious incident by our crew.

The main cause of this problem was that the fishing boat was not picked up on the radar due to the rough seas causing clutter and it could not be seen as it had no lights on. The best we can do in these circumstances is to maintain an all round lookout by all available means. The searchlight could be used to occasionally scan ahead. When rough seas are encountered, both radars should be regularly altered down to 3 mile range to try to see potential targets through the clutter.