Another great day - until ...

[argonaut]

Was having a blast out of the water, almost zero wind, sunshine - great conditions.

Look at the following clip you can see how flat the water is ................. unfortunately some t**** had decided to put some buoys out with 150m of free floating rope.

Look at following clip ... at 10sec point you will see buoys appearing and we gave them a wide berth ....... then I hit the rope ,,,, immediate smack into water, 26mph to zero instantly .... that is a serious faceplant.

We found 150m of rope floating on surface from the buoys before it disapeared down to some anchor block .... why would anyone put that much rope out ..... and in a designated water sports area,

I was not a happy teddy bear.

[mlines]

Ouch!

[Ianfs]

26mph to zero instantly .... that is a serious faceplant.

Goodness me rick, are you OK?

[BruceK]

I trust you removed the navigational hazard and now have 150m of rope?

Similar instance in Cardigan Bay. Travelling on the plane at 25knts and went between two buoys 70 yards apart. Hears a zinging sound and turned round to see the two buoys racing to meet each other in my wake before a snap release as the drives tore the rope to shreds. They had been bound together with floating rope. Had the rope been any thicker there would have been a good chance they could have ripped the drives off and sunk the vessel.

[argonaut]

No ... but reported it to the local council guys who operate the nearby launch slip ... and to the coast guard.

Bit of 'not my issue' though ............ council advised on the water is responsibility of RNLI & Coat guard not them.
Called coat guard they advised its responsibility of fisheries.

If I go out next week, I will have a large knife with me ....

Here is pick of rope in the water - we saw at least 150m of it ...

[sprocker]

Crickey. That could have caused serious injury!

Placed there by someone that has a grudge against watersports maybe?

[argonaut]

No .... I think more likley by an idiot ..... if it were just to cause a problem ... why put 5 buoys (with ID numbers) on the rope ....

[mlines]

On the plus side the water looks great. We hunted around the Solent on Saturday and could not find anywhere that was in any way flat so watersports were off.

Also, quite unbelievably, the "small boats" channel out past Calshot has been sown with lobster pots marked with transparent plastic containers. Almost impossible to see even in quite good conditions. I cannot see them lasting the weekend with the typical leisure boat traffic entering and leaving Southampton Water.

[Dave]

theres a few new ones in Southampton water isnt there...had a bit of zigging and zaggin when we went up to Ocean Village friday to get round a couple of them (black plastic 5L or so..)...and back on the sunday...what a gorgeous day sunday....bit chilly at speed but gorgeous.

[argonaut]

On the plus side the water looks great. r.

Here is another view of the buoys .... shows even better what the water was like yesterday ... you can just make out the start of the rope line going off across the bay