Boating expert and instructor Tara Foster joins WIRED to answer the internet's burning questions about boating. How many types of boats are there? How exactly to boats float? Why is speed on the water measured in knots? What are you supposed to do in a man overboard situation? What’s the most dangerous ocean on the planet? Answers to these questions and many more await on Boating Support.
Director: Justin Wolfson
Director of Photography: Charlie Jordan
Editor: Richard Trammell
Expert: Tara Foster
Line Producer: Jamie Rasmussen
Associate Producer: Brandon White
Production Manager: Peter Brunette
Production Coordinator: Rhyan Lark
Casting Producer: Nick Sawyer
Camera Operator: Caleb Weiss
Sound Mixer: Austin Ramsey
Production Assistant: Caleb Clark
Post Production Supervisor: Christian Olguin
Supervising Editor: Erica DeLeo
Assistant Editor: Billy Ward
Director: Justin Wolfson
Director of Photography: Charlie Jordan
Editor: Richard Trammell
Expert: Tara Foster
Line Producer: Jamie Rasmussen
Associate Producer: Brandon White
Production Manager: Peter Brunette
Production Coordinator: Rhyan Lark
Casting Producer: Nick Sawyer
Camera Operator: Caleb Weiss
Sound Mixer: Austin Ramsey
Production Assistant: Caleb Clark
Post Production Supervisor: Christian Olguin
Supervising Editor: Erica DeLeo
Assistant Editor: Billy Ward
Category
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TechTranscript
00:00I'm Coach Tara Foster, Safe Power Boat Handling Instructor and Safety and Rescue Boat Handling
00:04Instructor. I'm here today to answer your questions from the internet. This is Boat Support.
00:12All right, first up, Studio Barker asks, why do ships use port and starboard instead of left and
00:17right? When you're on a boat, if you're talking to someone who's right in front of you, their left is
00:21going to be opposite of your left, which means that if they need you to grab something really
00:25quickly, if there's an emergency or a problem, you need to have a common language for directions.
00:29So when we're talking about a boat, we want to refer to the left side as port in reference to
00:34the bow and stern, and then the right side would be starboard. So that way, even if someone's facing
00:38the back of the boat and someone else is facing the front of the boat, they're both able to refer to
00:41the same side at the same time. Tension LLC asks, how do I tie a cleat hitch? A cleat hitch is one of
00:46those common knots that we need to be able to tie when we're out boating. And a cleat that you're
00:50most commonly going to see is this one. It's a horn cleat. So when we go to tie a cleat hitch, we want
00:55to tie an O and then an eight. And then as you go to complete the eight, what we're going to do
00:59is essentially twist it under. This is called a half hitch. So we're going to lock this half hitch
01:03on and pull tight. And that is your cleat hitch. Good way to make sure you've tied it correctly
01:07is there should be two rivers under a bridge. The scuba news asks, where does the term mayday
01:12come from? So mayday is actually in reference to a French word, and I'm probably going to
01:16mispronounce it slightly here, midday, which means help me. Severe Taylor 8962 asks, how do you master
01:22docking and undocking? I can actually show you that now. One of the big things to keep in mind is slow
01:28is going to be your best friend when you're approaching a dock. You always want to make sure
01:32you're at minimum control speed, which means you're just adjusting between idle forward, neutral,
01:37and idle reverse as needed to essentially slowly maneuver your boat into the dock. Slow is pro.
01:44As I get in a little closer here, I want to make sure that my fenders are ready for my approach to
01:49the dock. Ball controlled thrust movements are going to be key as I bring my boat in safely to the dock.
01:57I just want to make sure I come in at a nice, easy pace. I'm able to get myself successfully tied
02:02off. Now, what I'm looking to do here is essentially tie off the line that's going to be doing the most
02:07amount of work first. The breeze pushing against the bow of my boat is essentially going to create
02:12more work on that line because it's pushing force against it. I want to tie that one off first
02:17because I need it to hold me in. I'll tie off my stern second. Once I'm firmly secured to the dock,
02:22I can go back and turn my engine off. Always make sure that your engine doesn't go off until you're
02:27firmly secured. It does take a little bit of practice to get docking right, so make sure you're in
02:31an area where you won't damage yourself or others and pick a nice, calm day to get your practice in.
02:36Secret Santa asks, worst boat name imaginable? I don't know if there's one that specifically comes
02:41to mind, but any boat name that you would be hesitant to call a mayday for is probably one that
02:47I would second guess. And if you have a better one, tell me in the comments. JackoTallTails asks,
02:52how would you deal with a man overboard situation? First things first, call it out really loudly.
02:57Make sure you point. Man overboard! And the reason why you'd want to do that is because you need to
03:03make sure that any other boaters in the area are aware that there's now someone in the water that
03:07they need to avoid and not hit. The next big step is to make sure that you are throttling down so that
03:13way you're not going at high speeds. So that way you regain control of the boat and can safely turn
03:17around to re-approach the person. Take essentially a big O turn around and approach coming bow into the breeze.
03:25The reason why you want to approach bow to breeze is that they're blown towards you and you're not
03:29blown on top of them. And then the last big piece of it is please do not reverse back towards them.
03:35That is putting them close to your prop and puts them and you in a very dangerous situation. Always
03:39make sure you're approaching in forward and as you get closer to them, you're going to want to bring
03:45the engine back into neutral so that way the prop is not spinning. The last thing we want to do is have
03:51a spinning prop near a human in the water. Drew to Read asks, nautical knots, what do I need to know?
03:57There are a ton of really useful knots but some of the most common and most useful ones would be
04:01something like a bowline. The way we teach it, we tell it with a story. So we've got a tree and we've
04:06got a hole at the bottom of the tree and the other end of your line is a rabbit. The rabbit's going to
04:11come up the hole around the base of the tree and dive back into the hole. And basically what it should
04:16look like at the end is a little life jacket around a stick pulled tight and that is how you create a
04:21really lovely strong loop. So this can be put over a piling or hung around something if you need to hang
04:28something up. Another really useful knot is a stopper knot. So a stopper knot stops a line from sliding
04:33through something. Another little story to remember it by is you make a snowman, you put his scarf around
04:38and you pop his carrot nose in and then you have a figure eight. And what that'll do is it'll stop the line
04:43from sliding through. These knots are really useful because they're easy to do what we call break.
04:47So they come undone very quickly. They have little loops that help them come undone and it doesn't
04:51put a ton of stress on the inside of the line which is the core of the line. When you tie something like
04:56a simple overhand knot what that does is it puts a lot of stress on the line and any knot will actually
05:02decrease the strength of your line as a whole. So what ends up happening then is you increase the risk
05:06of breakage. The other thing we want to avoid with an overhand knot is under a lot of stress or a big
05:11load. What'll end up happening is this becomes so tight it almost becomes impossible to undo because
05:15it doesn't have a good break point. So I'd avoid those overhand knots and try something else instead.
05:20Reddit user asks why is speed measured in knots when on a boat or a plane and why is distance measured in
05:25nautical miles? The way they used to measure speed was they would literally tie knots in a line and send
05:30it overboard and they'd see how fast they'd move in comparison to those knots. When the knots became a
05:35really standard set distance that was kind of the standard for measuring speed of a boat. Nautical miles are
05:40based off that distance of knots. So one knot is 1.15 miles per hour. The Frank Meister 4815 asks
05:48is there anything I can do to increase maneuverability? One of the best tools to increase
05:51your maneuverability and your understanding of how to best maneuver your boat is to master something
05:55called the pivot turn and I can show you that now. So the pivot turn utilizes small amount of forward
06:01and reverse thrust to essentially pivot your boat on a point. One of the biggest things to keep in mind
06:07is that you want the breeze to help you. So right now I'm utilizing the breeze coming this way to help
06:11push my bow down and because all the thrust in this boat's coming from the stern what I'm doing
06:16is trying to get my stern then where the heavier thrust is turned up into the breeze. Constantly
06:21checking my 360 making sure that I'm not getting near anything that could damage my boat or anybody
06:26around me. I'm only going into gear once my engine is fully turned over and that will let me turn a full 180 or
06:33if I need to a full 360. What ends up happening is you're able to spin decreasing your turning radius
06:38to zero when you've got good control over it. Loafed1 asks should I go faster or slower in choppy waters?
06:44You never want to go super fast unless you want a very bumpy ride that risks injuring yourself
06:49and anyone else on board but going too slow can also put you at the mercy of the waves around you.
06:55When you're going down a wave especially if it's a bigger wave you want to make sure that you're not
06:59going too fast because your bow the front of your boat will slam into the next wave and you'll
07:03submarine. If you go too slow you run the risk of the wave just carrying you so you need to make
07:07sure that you're reacting to the waves with the type of boat that you have. Unnecessary Jive asks
07:12what do you do when your anchor is completely stuck? It can be really frustrating when you're outboating
07:18you anchor for a while and then you go to pull your anchor up and it's stuck. One of the first things
07:21you want to make sure you do is you've moved your boat to be directly on top of your anchor point.
07:25Basically what you want to do is help lift that back end of your anchor so it becomes directly up
07:31which will help get it unstuck. The next thing I would do is maybe start to swivel around. Be careful
07:36as you do that though and make sure there's nothing in your way as you swivel around it because that
07:40can help free it. You want to make sure that you're not going to run anything over. Make sure you're
07:43still keeping a good lookout for other boats around you. Coastal Near asks what is with the hate for
07:48pontoons? I think the hate for pontoons comes from the fact that they're essentially like taking your
07:53dock out into the middle of the lake for the day. They tend to be very common amongst folks who aren't really
07:58going out for moving around very much but they're really stable which makes them a great platform
08:04for folks who might have mobility issues or for young kids and they tend to have some really great
08:09siding to help keep especially younger kids from leaning overboard and going overboard. They tend to
08:14be disliked just because they're not super maneuverable. They don't go very fast. Usually people are out
08:19there enjoying a really good time which can be nuisance to anyone in the area sometimes.
08:24Bleep Buck asks how do boats float? Boats pretty much float on what is a displacement theory using
08:31essentially formulations on density and taking up enough area to account for how much mass is there.
08:37So it's an equation on mass and volume. They displace water. So if you've ever taken like a
08:43Tupperware and put it in your bathtub it's going to float because it's spreading that area out across the
08:48water and sharing the weight across that. Boats do the same thing. Everything from the big ships to the
08:54little ones they use displacement to float. Zex258 asks anchor length for lakes first time anchor buyer.
09:00You want to make sure you have the right type of anchor for the location you're going to be boating.
09:05So this is a mushroom anchor which is great for kind of muddy or silty bottoms. It's going to hold
09:10based largely on its weight. I usually wouldn't recommend a mushroom anchor for a boat but it's
09:16great if you need to set something aside. So if you brought a raft with you or anything like that
09:20this could be a super helpful tool. A slightly more common one that we see especially for small
09:24boats would be your Danforth anchor. It's not going to be something that's going to hold down our big
09:29old ship over here but it absolutely will help with any of your small like recreational power boats.
09:34And what it does is it digs into sand, silt, but you want to make sure first things first you're
09:39getting the right anchor for the bottom you're going to be anchoring on. You want enough chain to help kind
09:44of drag the anchor back. The amount of line you want is typically five to one for the depth of the
09:50lake you're going to be boating in. Let's say you're boating in a lake that has 20 feet of depth. You
09:54need a hundred feet of anchor line in order to safely anchor for the day. Cauliflower nice 180.
10:00What are the top reasons people lose their vehicles? Most often it's because they forget their parking
10:04break. When you're at the boat ramp it's really important to not panic even if you're not totally sure
10:09you know what you're doing. Make sure that you're taking those moments to breathe utilizing your parking
10:13brake not going too far down the ramp because you don't want your wheels on any slippery algae
10:17and making sure that you have a trailer that's appropriately fitted to your car so that your car
10:22can actually pull it forward. Saratoshi asks why don't ships have brakes because there's not enough
10:27friction between the boat and the water. Your car has brakes because when you try to stop the wheel
10:33it has all that friction from the pavement and the roadway underneath. We don't have that same sort of
10:38grip. What we have instead is a lot of inertia which is if you remember going back to high school
10:42physics here right a thing in motion wants to stay in motion. So your boat will actually try
10:46to continue moving in whatever direction you were moving in. In order to essentially stop it you have
10:51to go in the opposite direction. So if you're going forward you might have to use reverse to bring your
10:56boat to a stop. Jungle Jawa asks how important is trim on a small outboard? So trim is really important
11:01on a small outboard. So trim refers to how your motor is positioned on the back of your boat. If for
11:07example this is your boat and you have an engine out the back what you want to be thinking about
11:10is is it trimmed up which is usually how we store engines at the end of the day or trim down. Now
11:15when you're trying to go you want to make sure that the propeller is all the way in the water but we
11:20want to make sure that the hood of the engine is actually parallel to the water. If you over trim
11:24the boat in one direction you'll drive the bow down and if you under trim in this direction you're
11:29actually going to drive the bow up. Both of those can make really unsafe conditions for the boat either
11:33leading to submarining and swamping or leaving your bow too high up which reduces your visibility
11:39forward and can run the risk of hitting things or swamping out the stern. Next question is from
11:43a Reddit user. How common is capsizing? If you're taking into account what's happening that day with
11:48the weather and with the water you should be able to avoid a capsize especially if you're using the
11:53right size boat for the right size scenario. That being said if you do find yourself in a capsize
11:58situation it's really important to stay with or near your boat as long as it's safe to do so. A lot of
12:02people get the instinctual fear of oh gosh the boat's gone over I need to get away from it. Unfortunately what that
12:08means is if someone's coming up to assist and rescue you they're now going to have to search for a
12:12little head floating nearby when their focus is probably on the big boat that has overturned. To
12:16help reduce the risk of collisions or getting run over you should stay close to be able to wave down
12:21help. Rational asks what's the most dangerous or extreme ocean? So that would be the southern ocean.
12:26100 percent that's that's going to be the one with the most extreme conditions the most dangerous waves
12:32voters are going to want to enter that with a lot of caution. NP819 asks what are the most
12:37important unwritten rules for boating? The most important ones are always having a good lookout
12:42that is technically written but I always need to re-emphasize that one when you're out on the
12:46water it can be really easy to kind of fall into that false sense of security of look at all this
12:51space there's no yellow and white lines like when you're driving boats and people and animals and all
12:57these other wonderful things that float down the water sometimes can impact your day and turn a great
13:02day of boating into a really dangerous day of boating. And a good lookout is searching in all three
13:0760 degrees from the top of the boat not only where you're going but what's coming behind you and
13:11what's coming at you from the sides. Aquara user asks does a boat sit higher in salt water? Yes salt
13:16water will definitely keep your boat floating a little higher. Salt water is heavier so it'll create
13:21a lower displacement so especially if you're in a smaller boat you'll definitely feel that difference.
13:26The Wasps asks how many different types of boats are there? Probably too many. So every manufacturer
13:32loves to come up with the newest latest and greatest there's some gorgeous classic boats out there
13:36but I would say the biggest thing to keep in mind is whether you're looking for a monohull which has
13:41just one hull, a catamaran which would have two hulls, or a trimaran which has three. Make sure you keep
13:46in mind that different types of boats have different uses and purposes and different stability. You want
13:51to make sure you find the right one for where you are boating and what you're boating for. So
13:55Call Me Lovely asks how fast do boats go? Some boats can go upwards of 100 miles per hour or even faster.
14:02Most frequently the ones you're going to be interacting with are probably going to go about
14:05the speed of your car on a highway and smaller boats will go slower. It really depends on the
14:09size of the boat. The current water speed record is 318 miles per hour. Fratherine asks hey boaters
14:15what is your cutoff for wind speed when considering whether or not to launch a boat for the day? One of
14:19the first things I'd check for is a small craft advisory anywhere from 21 to 33 knots and what that
14:24means is that the wind is definitely kicking up enough that if you're not a very experienced boater you should be
14:29wary about heading out that day. The other thing to look for is if there is a gust advisory or warning
14:34that could definitely urge some big caution especially depending on the size and type of
14:38boat you're going out in. Aldtrader asks outboard versus inboard. Outboard engines are engines that
14:44you can see they're attached to the stern the back of the boat they're a little easier to do maintenance
14:48on in my opinion because you can walk right to the back of the boat take the hood off and check your
14:52engine. An inboard engine is going to be inside the boat you need to make sure you're watching out for and
14:56being careful of any fume buildup so you have blowers then on your boat to blow out any cavities
15:02in the boat you're actually probably going to go down into the cockpit or into the hold to check on
15:06that engine and do any maintenance. Wynn asks what are the tips for dealing with seasickness? They do
15:11have all those cool fun gadgets like the glasses with the water in them and like motion sickness
15:16bracelets and things like that all of those can be definitely great aids but the first step I would
15:21recommend for anyone who knows they suffer from motion sickness would be making sure you're hydrated
15:25making sure that you've had a good meal. I know that can seem a little counterintuitive but really
15:30truly if you've eaten a good meal and you are really well hydrated and you have a good eye for
15:36the horizon line you're much less likely to get seasick. DrGamble6 asks is red right returning not
15:41a thing anymore? It's still a thing and when you're returning to port what we're looking for are red and
15:46green channel markers and the red ones those are going to be triangular shaped or none shaped the green
15:51channel markers will be squares or pans they actually look like big floating cylinders out in the water
15:57when you're heading back into your safe harbor the red ones should be on your right. On to the next
16:02Trabasi asks how do you go about understanding what different hull shape and motor sizes can do in
16:06different waters? You wouldn't want to take something like a skiff which has a flat bottom out into really
16:11heavy waters because the flat bottom is going to slide across the water a lot easier than something like
16:16this which has a much deeper cut from this center keel. The keel is the bottom of your boat the area
16:21that kind of digs into the water the most so different hull shapes have different looks to them
16:26so this would be a shallow v a deep v would dig much further down and be a much more severe v shape
16:32across the center of the boat something like a whaler would have something like a cathedral hull like a
16:36cathedral shape upside down for a different type of grip in different types of conditions you definitely
16:41want to make sure that you're paying attention to what type of waters you're going to most often
16:45experience to determine what type of boat is going to be safest in that area p nick b asks when slip
16:51neighbors have trouble docking should you ignore stand ready or actively offer help if someone's in
16:55need we should offer aid but that being said if you don't know if they need help i wouldn't actively
17:01jump into a situation that you might put yourself at risk of getting hurt i wouldn't necessarily ignore
17:05it but i would stand ready in case they call out and say hey can you give us a hand here let's be on
17:10the boat says has anyone traveled the great loop and how was it yes people still travel the great
17:15loop the great loop is essentially a giant loop that goes over and around the eastern waterways
17:21so through the intercoastal system down the eastern seaboard and then up and around the edge of the
17:25gulf of mexico and then up through the mississippi river into the great lakes channels and the locks
17:31there so if you make this big old loop it'll take some time depending on the type of boat you're in
17:36it's definitely a great way to get a good view on the united states from a different perspective leaf buggy
17:41asks is holover the most dangerous waterway in the us so holover is based in florida it's an inlet
17:47which means it's an entry point from open waters into inland waters it's not the most dangerous
17:53but it's definitely one of the ones that's most frequently filmed there are several really dangerous
17:57inlets all around the united states one of the ones that i frequently see mentioned is one of the more
18:01dangerous ones would be the columbia river bar along the border of washington and oregon known as the
18:06boat graveyard of the pacific the dangerous piece about inlets is that's where there's a pinch point
18:11so all the water rushing in or out as the tides change gets essentially funneled through that one
18:16point which can create shifting sandbars when a lot of water has to push through one tiny area it can
18:21create some really dangerous currents and then also some really severe waves and backwash coming off the
18:26sides of the inlet when that happens you run the risk of getting into some pretty scary and sketchy
18:31situations it's the moose man asks how does a boat motor work and how does a small propeller move
18:36such a large object propellers work because they move so quickly it's pulling enough water through
18:41that it's creating enough thrust to move big heavy objects the size of the propeller should be the right
18:46fit for the right size boat and there's usually some manufacturer recommendations for different boats
18:51on what you should be looking at in terms of horsepower and in terms of propeller size boat motors most
18:56of the time nowadays at least they're four stroke they intake they compress they combust and
19:01then they have an exhaust so that's how they function the river shark asks for those who
19:06occasionally host guests on their boat what's an annoying recurring thing your guests do to
19:10annoy the crud out of you so one of the most annoying things to have to do when you're on a
19:13boat is to constantly have to ask guests to get out of the way when you're going through a demanding
19:18maneuver whether that's docking getting out of a dock space or going through a really tight area where
19:23there's a lot of boat traffic one of the first things i always like to do is before i take a guest out on
19:28the boat i explain to them where i need them to sit especially when we're in those demanding areas
19:33where i have to be a little more maneuverable myself around the boat or i need to be a little
19:37more on alert and pay attention to especially constrained areas undercover 500 asks what's an
19:43unusual but handy item that every boater should have my answer might surprise you but i really love
19:48a good roll of e-tape so electrical tape is really handy because it's waterproof duct tape is great and
19:53useful it has its purposes but it does tend to leave a lot of residue electrical tape will leave
19:58a little less residue and will do the job just as well also really great if you need to attach some
20:03things in the boat because it'll stick and it'll stay pretty waterproof a ready user asks how long
20:07until the swaying feeling goes away so the swaying feeling that they're referring to is when you get
20:11off the boat and you still feel like you're on the boat what it is is it's reverse motion sickness
20:15essentially it's land sickness so your equilibrium which is you know how your body adjusts and feels to
20:21where you're situated in the world still thinks it's on the boat and it hasn't quite settled back
20:25down yet how long until it goes away that varies on the person all right that's it that's all the
20:30questions i hope you learned something and we'll see you on the water