PEYC Forth Ports Visit
Published 10:02am on 12 Jan 2025
On Friday 10th January, Linda Cooper & Jim Scott welcomed a visit to PEYC by Richard Littlefield, the newly appointed Marine Compliance Officer for Forth Ports, based at Grangemouth. As well as his professional maritime experience, he has sailed dinghies and yachts; in fact he started sailing Bosun dinghies with the Sea Cadets out of Rosyth and Port Edgar. One of his tasks is to be the point of contact between Forth Ports, as the Statuatary Harbour Authority, and the many water based recreational clubs around the Forth. He was keen to visit PEYC as one of the most active sailing clubs on the estuary and was very complimentary about our new clubhouse.
Richard explained that the UK Government's Port Marine Safety Code has recently been updated and the MCA (Maritime & Coastal Agency) requires the UK Statuatary Harbour Authorities to liaise more closely with recreational clubs in their areas. In particular, do they have:
- Club structure identified
- Risk assessments completed
- Safety management plans published
He was impressed by PEYC's documentation which comprehensively covers these areas, although he did comment that it was difficult to locate on our website. Linda explained that PEYC adopted the SCM (Sailing Club Manager) system in 2024 and is in process of revising the website structure to make it easier to find things. An obvious area of concern is any of PEYC's racing fleet impeding commercial vessels in the restricted shipping channels. Since 2002 there have been only 5 incidents that caused Forth Ports to contact the club, the last in 2015, all of which have been dealt with to their satisfaction. However, PEYC raised a 'near miss' report for Sun 3rd Nov 2024 when an inbound LPG tanker slowed down and made 5 sound signals as the yacht fleet crossed from mark K2 towards mark X, but sufficiently far ahead to be safe. As a result, the club will mandate all race officers, running races that cross the shipping channels, to contact Forth Navigation beforehand about expected ship traffic.
Jim also explained that PEYC applies annually to Forth Ports for permission to lay our race marks and that an NtM (Notice to Mariners) is usually issued detailing their positions. The club is considering shifting mark F, the start/finish buoy off Port Edgar, closer inshore, but will consult in particular with the master of the dredger Forth Sentinel, currently based at PE, to ensure that the mark's position is acceptable.
Last updated 9:59pm on 14 January 2025