Revenge is sweet

Things sometimes happen at sea that make you want to go and give someone a good talking to. Usually it's an obnoxious powerboat cutting too close or throwing a huge wake around. You want to track them down and give them a piece of your mind. Of course, around here those powerboat owners also have a huge pickup SUV with a gun locker in the back and an attitude to match, so you have to sigh and just wish it wasn't so.

Yesterday we hear a radio call.

"The powerboat off my starboard bow, this is warship 41 off your port quarter, respond please"
They repeat a couple of times, the voice is a well spoken female, but carries more urgency each time.
Eventually someone replies
"Warship 41, this is research vessel xyz at position blah, are you calling me?"
"Sir, are you the boat just in front of us, because we are at flank speed trying to launch a helicopter off our aft deck and we need you to alter course right now"
"Erm, what course do you want me to take up?"
A male voice cuts in and says "This is the captain of warship 41, that IS NOT the way you operate at sea, do you hear me, you have forced us to abort the helo launch and take evasive action. If I could find a way to get your licence taken away, I would"
"Err, I am at position blah, I'm not sure it's me you're talking to"
The female voice returns "Sir, we got the name of that vessel as 'Best Friend', is that you?'
"No maam, it's not"
"Sorry sir. Have a good day"

Now that was interesting, but if you have pissed off a warship captain here, be assured they have powers denied to most of us. Within minutes there are conversations between the ship and the local coastguard and things are happening. About ten minutes later we hear:
"Best Friend, Best Friend, this is warship 82 half a mile behind you calling you on channel 16"
And then
"Best Friend, Best Friend, this is warship 82 calling you and flashing you with signal lights"
And finally, though we can't hear Best Friend's side of the story, we hear "Yes, Best Friend, I copy that phone number. We will call you on that line momentarily to obtain your details"

Coming within 500 yards of a navy ship carries a huge fine here, plus that threat of 'deadly force' so I think there's one powerboat skipper sleeping poorly tonight. And if you ever find yourself at sea in a fast powerboat thinking "hey, that's a big grey ship there, but I reckon if we put our foot down we can just get across in front of him", well, think again.

There's clearly a big navy exercise going on near here, we keep hearing broadcasts on the radio asking boats to keep clear, the roar of jet engines taking off from a carrier, the occasional 'crump' of live fire and a few minutes ago a scary looking helicopter can towards us flying low over the waves, circled slowly around us and disappeared back to the west. Just making sure we were leaving, I guess.

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