Why Did a U.S. Destroyer Fail to Dodge a Cargo Ship?

Re:Why Did a U.S. Destroyer Fail to Dodge a Cargo Ship? by astrodust on Saturday June 24, 2017 @04:21PM (#14627305)

Even if it was in the middle of a hurricane with twenty foot swells on a moonless night you'd still expect a destroyer to be able to spot 29,000 tons of metal coming at it.

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Re:Why Did a U.S. Destroyer Fail to Dodge a Cargo Ship? by dogma1138 on Saturday June 24, 2017 @05:09PM (#14627491)

Dark colored ship with dark colored containers on a pitch black night. Nope can't really spot it.

Get out of the city to realize just how dark it can be.

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Re:Why Did a U.S. Destroyer Fail to Dodge a Cargo Ship? by astrodust on Saturday June 24, 2017 @05:13PM (#14627505)

I know how dark it can be outside of the city. I also don't carry around a radar system worth tens of millions of dollars that's operated by a crew that's supposed to be paying attention to where their $1.7B vessel is going.

Surely a ship of that sort has a pretty robust night vision system, if not multiple methods of detecting things including thermal or lidar.

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Re:Why Did a U.S. Destroyer Fail to Dodge a Cargo Ship? by twic on Saturday June 24, 2017 @07:38PM (#14627930)

I've sailed a yacht across a shipping lane in the middle of the night. You really can spot them.

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Re:Why Did a U.S. Destroyer Fail to Dodge a Cargo Ship? by CalChris on Saturday June 24, 2017 @08:01PM (#14627981)

Yep, you start seeing them over the horizon. If both bridge heights are 100 feet, they're visible at 25 miles.

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