No trick questions this week: What are five required pieces of equipment the USCG looks for when doing a safety inspection?
Last week’s Mindbender was slightly trickier: You are sailing on starboard tack, steering a compass course of 130 degrees. When you tack onto port your new course is 34 degrees. With a deviation of 7 degrees east and a variation of 15 degrees west, what true course do you plot on your chart?
Good thing Cruising Compass readers are a smart lot…if you answered 26 degrees, you were right. Technically speaking, it is not reasonable to assume that if you are on a starboard tack steering 130 that you would tack onto port and steer a course of 34 degrees. You could tack from port to starboard, though!
Thanks to Peirce Brawner for identifying the trick and correctly answering last week’s question.
