dissident wrote:The latest propaganda BS from the chihuahua statelet known as the UK is that Russia confused the tanker with GPS jamming. This crap is for the typical ignorant mass media consumer who has no clue about what qualifications ship navigators need and what equipment is on board tankers and other ships.
1) GPS is not the EXCLUSIVE tool for ship navigation. Tankers have radar and can determine the positions of ships around them.
2) It is a requirement that ships be able to operate without fancy equipment. That is, visually. This narrow section of the Gulf offers plenty of visual clues such as the Iranian coast. Territorial waters are 7 nautical miles. It is very easy to see Iranian land from this distance. If there is any doubt as toward which coast the ship is headed, look at the other coast it would be invisible being over 50 km away. And there is plenty of other ship traffic going in and out of the Gulf. If the tanker crew was somehow being jammed to the point they could not even use their radar, they would not have b-lined for Iranian waters since the overall ship traffic route is parallel to the Iranian coast.
Everything you say is true however it is not always practiced. The prime example is the recent spate of destroyer collisions. Less in the general news but there are times when the professional mariners just screw up. Some nitwit in the med ran into a anchored ship. A Russian ran into a suspension bridge in SK. Given the amount of traffic these incidents are not frequent, but they do happen.
Remember there were on 23 crew aboard. That’s only 7 per shift. Not all of them are on the bridge. It’s common at sea for there to be a single person on the bridge although in this subject area on would think they would have more.
Just saying sometimes shit happens. Should not but does.