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Vincent Pica
Chief of Staff, First District, Southern Region (D1SR)
United States Coast Guard Auxiliary
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“Sabby the Lingo?” Maritime Language – VIII
As noted prior, each discipline has a language and that language conveys competency to the listener. This column is part of a series of maritime vocabulary words. So you can sound like the salty ol’ mariner you are… We’ll run enough of these to get the major concepts and phraseology from Alpha to Zulu in front of you!
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- Company - The whole crew of a ship..
- Complement - The number of officers and crew employed upon a vessel for its safe navigation and operation.
- Cordage - Any rope or line.
- Corinthian - A 19th century term for a yachtsman who sails his own yacht without the help of a professional skipper.
- Cuddy - A small sheltered cabin on a boat.
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| C - Charlie International Meaning: "Yes" or "affirmative". Meaning in a Sailing Regatta: Change of Course |
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| D – Delta International Meaning: I am maneuvering with difficulty; keep clear. |
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- Danforth Anchor - A brand of lightweight anchor. It has pivoting flukes that dig into the ground as tension is placed on the anchor.
- Davy Jones - Nautical slang for the spirit of the sea, usually in the form of a sea devil. Davy Jones's Locker is the bottom of the sea, the final resting place of sunken ships, articles lost or thrown overboard, and of men buried at sea.
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- Daybeacon - A fixed navigation aid structure, visible during the day, used in shallow waters upon which is placed one or more daymarks.
- Daymark - A signboard attached to a daybeacon to convey navigational information presenting one of several standard shapes (square, triangle, rectangle) and colors (red, green, orange, yellow, or black). Daymarks usually have reflective material indicating the shape.
- Dead Ahead - A position directly in front of the vessel.
- Dead Astern - A position directly aft or behind the vessel.
- Dead on End - Said of wind when exactly ahead; and of another vessel when her fore and aft line coincides with observer's line of sight.
- Dead Reckoning - The process of plotting a theoretical position or future position based on advancing from a known position using speed, time, and course, without aid of objects on land, of sights, etc. Term comes from deduced reckoning, abbreviated first to "ded reckoning".
- Deadhead - (1) A floating log. (2) A useless member of the crew.
- Deadlight - Fixed ports that do not open which are placed in the deck or cabin to admit light.
- Deadrise - The measurement of the angle between the bottom of a boat and its widest beam. A vessel with a 0º deadrise has a flat bottom, high numbers indicate deep V shaped hulls.
- Deviation - (1) Differences between the compass reading and an actual magnetic direction caused by magnetic forces in the vicinity of the compass, which are usually the result of masses of metal, speaker magnets, etc. (2) Vessel departure from specified voyage course.
- Deviation Card - A listing of a particular boat's steering deviation on each point of the compass
- Devil to Pay - Old seafaring term meaning something very difficult or awkward.
- Dock - The area a boat rests in when attached to a pier or wharf; also the act of taking the boat to the pier to secure it
- Dog - Heavy latch by which doors, hatches, portholes, etc., are secured; verb - to latch
- Draft - (1) The depth of the boat below the waterline; the amount of vertical distance from a boats water line to the bottom of it's keel. (2) The depth of water necessary to float a vessel (3) The belly or chord depth of the sail, its fullness
More in the weeks ahead…!
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BTW, if you are interested in being part of USCG Forces, email me at JoinUSCGAux@aol.com or go direct to the D1SR Human Resources department, who are in charge of new members matters, at DSO-HR and we will help you “get in this thing…”
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