Why Don't Ships Speak English?

✩ABOUT THIS VIDEO✩
In this video, we investigate the process of communication between vessels. We touch on signalling flags, morse code, standard maritime communication phrases, and VHF communication.

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All content on this channel is provided for entertainment purposes only. Although every effort has been made to ensure the content is accurate and up to date, it remains the responsibility of the viewer to determine its accuracy and validity. The content should never be used to substitute professional advice or education.

[therealtony]

My favorite ships communicate by getting really really close and telling secrets!

[megamihestia]

Now thinking about it, flag language is essentially how modern video games allow players from different countries to communicate. Emotes or auto-translate in some games are basically flags that’s carrying predetermined agreed upon messages.

[stewieatb]

It would take far too long to dig out the tweet where someone originally told this story, but it goes something like this:

"When at school I was in the Sea Cadets. On camp one year, one of the lads was caught giving himself a seeing to in the barracks. Thereafter he got the nickname 'Zulu', from the code flag meaning 'I require a tug'."

[Deadonstick]

Small correction. The communication method described at 4:50 isn't simplex; it's half-duplex.

Simplex is one-way only, period.
Half-duplex is two-way; but only one at a time.
Full-duplex is two-way; two at a time.

Simplex communication would render one ship a permanent receiver and the other a permanent sender.

[Aengus]

I used to live in Brixham, Devon. The lifeboat station, when it was about to launch, would let off two rockets that you could hear as bangs & at night you'd see a white flash too.
That was the signal for me to tune my scanner into the small ships safety channel 67.
I've heard some amazing rescues! Plus the air sea rescue helicopter "Whisky Bravo". Their callsign always made me smile as it just had to stand for "Whirly-Bird" 😆

[rebellsky]

But how did they communicate with flags back in the day when the world was only black and white? 🤨

[Hobbyblasphemist]

What I found funny whilst at sea was reading emails where non native speakers had picked up very odd English phrases and just used them constantly. “For your perusal” and “for the sake of good order” we’re found in almost every email I saw.

[wraithcadmus]

My favourite flag code is "I wish to communicate with you in Norwegian" - ZA7

[oneilmw]

0:55 Never would I have guessed that HW6 means "I have collided with an iceberg." Such useful life advice. It's so applicable!

[trinomial-nomenclature]

My father was an offshore fisherman in Nova Scotia, he retired a few years ago, and they still use VHF to communicate to one another and I think to shore as well.

[jaquigreenlees]

Ship to shore connections to telephone system were in use locally until well into the 1980s. My dad had a multichannel handheld vhf unit ( first one ever actually, custom built for him ) for his job as a shipping agent and we regularly talked with him on the system until cell phones came out.

[baileywright]

How timely! I am almost finished a cross stitch of my daughter's name in signal flags! I have always thought they were neat. I even have a 6 foot Whiskey flag off an old canaler hanging up in my office. I remember being a kid and pouring over the page in our big old dictionary that had them. For some reason, India always creeped me out.
Thanks for the video!

[sminthian]

I work with these kinds of maritime wordings. The two versions of rules are "shall" and "may". Shall means you need to do it. May means you can do it, but don't need to.

[Deltarious]

My favourite naval communication is to sail in columns with 23 other ships manned by my friends and to signal them Equal Speed, Charlie, London to ask them to move into a single battle line

[bilbolagginz]

Im in the navy and work as a radioman, cool to see you talk about some of my job.

[CLipka]

1:14 - Many people don't realize, but not only does "SOS" not stant for anything in particular - that three-letter combination is *NOT EVEN THE ACTUAL DISTRESS SIGNAL* .
You see, morse code requires pauses to indicate the end of one letter and the beginning of the next (ideally exactly long enough that another dot could fit in there). The actual letter sequence "SOS" would have such pauses, but the distress signal does NOT - the entire distress signal has the rank of a single letter, comprised of nine symbols stringed together with particular pauses.
Funnily enough, you got this detail just the wrong way round, for BOTH the international distress signal AND the older CQD: While the distress signal as a whole is just one huge pseudo-letter (but you erroneously depict it with pauses), the CQD signal was a "shorthand" comprised of three distinctive proper letters, and therefore should have the letter separator pauses (which you erroneously omitted).

[vinnyjhawer]

Love your content, its always clear and concise. Oh, and your illustrations are excellent making things easier to understand. Look forward to your newest content.

[VAM_Physics_and_Engineering]

I found that visual of the radio frequency slowly going upwards until it completed the circuit incredibly satisfying

[nothing]

Daaaamn, that sponsor transition was smoooth af

[karstendoerr]

SOS later acquired a meaning, it was interpreted as "Save Our Souls". But there is also the interpretation with "Save Our Ship".