(All about bridge-to-bridge radio talk)

Not long ago fellow instructors convened at the Honorable Willy Wall, our floating clubhouse, to discuss the upcoming season. Over the years I've been a keen observer of BRM (that's Bridge Resource Management) practices and have seen and heard how bad communication leads to problems.

Consider this situation: in tight quarters off Castle William, a large commercial sailing vessel and the Staten Island ferry are both trying to arrange a passing agreement. The sailing vessel is boxed in tight by the island, where it's shallow, and the ferry has just left the Whitehall racks.  Searoom is a finite thing, especially at low speeds! Can anyone hear the white knuckles cracking? I could, from more than a mile away! We were sailing that day, too, and always monitor 13.

The paraphrased agreement is my best memory of the situation--it's not based on any recording.

The ferry's outbound and has the sailing vessel off her port side, ahead by (let's just say) 600 yards.  We'll call the large sailing vessel the 'CC'. Let's listen to how it played out that day:

Staten Island Ferry (SIF): On the CC, cap, what are you doing?
CC: I'm trying to head up the range here, I'm a little out of room. I need it on two [whistles].
SIF: CC, I'm outbound for St. George. I need to see you on one [whistle].
CC: Cap, I'd like it on two, I'm really out of room here. [CC is very close to shore on Governor's Island.]
SIF: CC, this isn't really good for me, I need the room to do this on one.
CC: I'm way too close to the island here, I really need two.
SIF: You want to cut me like that [across my bow]?
CC: Okay.

What followed was lots of...silence. The SIF picked up speed and shot by CC, end of problem.

Now, sailors, a test: what had the captains agreed to?

Syntactically speaking, there's room for confusion. "Okay," might have referred to the CC agreeing to cut the ferry's bow for a two-whistle pass.

"Do you really want this cake?"
"Okay."

On the other hand, in the context of the captains' disagreement, you could also read that "Okay" as CC's recognition that his proposal was a bad idea and that he was now intending to follow the Ferry's lead of a one-whistle pass.

Since the two captains didn't speak further, there's no way to know. Analysts who study this sort of thing refer to speech-act confusions. Had a collision, or near-collision, occurred, the transcript would tell a tale of bad communication.

Both the Ferry and CC made poor choices of words and in not terminating their dialogue appropriately that day. Understanding why they made those choices would help avoid this sort of issue in the future, and keep everybody out of the papers. Which, in the end, is what it's about when you're using your license to pay your mortgage.