No Talk, All Action

IS ANYBODY LISTENING? VHF MAY SEEM STRANGELY QUIET TODAY.

- Jason Y. Wood

In a day and age for which the term “oversharing” were seemingly invented, I find it amusing that people have clammed up. No, I’m not talking about a sudden and striking lack of posts on social media, nor am I talking about the flow of email, text messages, voicemails, and yes, even phone calls coming to a grinding halt. Those are all still at dangerously bloated levels.

What I’m talking about is the VHF on the helm. Simply put, beyond the level of close-quarters marine chatter— think calls to bridge tenders, marina staff, fuel docks, and yes, even an occasional boat-to-boat call on 13 to make sure the watch on the bridge of that ship sees us—there’s a shocking lack of VHF traffic.

Have you noticed that? Power & Motoryacht’s Senior Electronics Editor Ben Ellison concurs. “Cruising down the East Coast to Maryland it was very quiet,” he says with a chuckle. “I began to wonder if the VHF wasn’t working right.” Every mariner knows that the radio check is a key start to every departure, yet so many people seem to say, I’m not going that far, and I have my cell phone. I don’t know how your cell coverage is, but mine fails often enough to make me wonder if it even counts as a layer of protection.

“I’m not hearing a lot of chatter,” Ellison continues. “I kind of like that. I remember coming from Maine through Long Island Sound and suddenly hearing so much traffic on 16 or even 9—people calling each other—it was really annoying and I didn’t want to hang out on those channels. But it doesn’t seem true anymore.”

I spoke to a couple skippers who have definite ideas about how they use their VHF systems in conjunction with the rest of their electronics. One thing is for certain, they know it’s there, and they know it’s ready for action.