gr71 wrote:i was keeping clear all the time and it was your luff that created that contact...
Also you need to consider that you shall give me room to keep clear under 16.1 which you don't because room is space to comply with my rule 12 obligations which I don't if there is contact
1. A slow luff from a boat clear ahead is not a violation of rule 16.1.
2. A boat changing course shall give the other boat room to keep clear. But if the other boat would not have been able to keep clear even without the course change, then how can she be given room? Impossible.
where in the rules book is written "wiggle room"?
"Wiggle room" is not written in the rules book, which is why it's put in quotes. It's an expression used by umpires.
It's the minimum course changes a right of way boat can make in normal situations. Typically the room in the immediate contact zone, as referred to in the definition of keep clear for boats overlapped on same tack.
Without "wiggle room" a keep clear boat can hold a right of way boat "in jail", preventing her from changing course because it would cause contact. This does not make sense of course.
What is logic is that the right of way boat can move her stern and bow within the immediate contact zone.
This zone is where a boat coming from clear astern shall not put her nose, as if it creates overlap, it would cause contact.
If I luffed less, there would not have been contact, but you would have overlapped a few centimeters to leeward of me, and you would immediately have broken rule 19.2c because you would have overlapped in the immediate contact zone and a luff would have made contact. Again, order of events here are not important. The fact that I'm luffing before you overlap gives you a better chance of keeping clear (by luffing).
Harald