Skipper’s View

THE ADVENT OF DIGITAL CHARTS HAS BEEN TRULY REVOLUTIONARY, BUT DITCHING YOUR PAPER CHARTS WOULD BE A POOR CHOICE

THIS MONTH, one subject seems to crop up time and again and that's the matter of navigation. It's possibly not the most glamorous of subjects but definitely fundamental to our sport. The question of digital vs paper just keep coming up and its a subject that is always guaranteed to get people talking. I guess things kicked o in earnest in July 2022 when the UKHO announced that it was planning on discontinuing its range of Admiralty paper charts - used by sailors for over two centuries. That got many people going and eventually led to the UKHO rowing back on it's plan and stating it would continue to produce them until at least 2030. We examine the choice between paper and digital in Sam Fortescue's article on p66, with further thoughts from Tom Cunli e on p70 plus a look at the latest chartplotters on p60.

It's an interesting issue that gets to the heart of the question of digital vs analogue. This magazine itself lies there too of course: are you reading it on paper or on your iPad? I must admit that, as a sailor, I long ago shoved most of my paper charts to the back to the chart table and merrily navigate using my phone. Yet this does have serious limitations. Back in the day when I used to steadfastly plot my Estimated Position every hour, I was a more thoughtful sailor and much less likely to get caught in a downtide position. Equally last year, after a particularly fraught and spray strewn trip across the English Channel in a 23' boat, I found that the phones of both the skipper and myself had been destroyed by constant soakings and we were suddenly in a somewhat precarious position. Equally, of an the evening, there's no better way to plan out a passage than to crack open a beer and pore over a full sized chart of the area. I've also always much preferred a solid hard cover pilot book to it's digital brother. The truth is that, while print is black and white, the issue of digital vs analogue is far less binary. The two work very well together and by using them in conjunction, you can find your way from port to port, or indeed across oceans, with far greater ease.

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