Horns out of Miami

[skooter35]

We will be setting sail in 11 more days!!! Im wondering if the ships at Port of Miami sound their horns like they do at Port Everglades.

I absolutely love hearing them on the webcams and will be on the beach Friday as they sail away. My cruise is the next day out of Miami and Im really hoping that the ships make some noise heading out or passing one another going into the turn basin.

[LHT28]

yes of course they do

 

it is not just for your amusement that they sound the horn

[rjack22]

I love hearing the Royal Princess's horn! For those of you who don't know, it plays the first two lines of the Love Boat song!

[TrqoisWtrs]

This

of the Disney ships is awesome. :)

[mom says]

Normal ship operation requires that the ship sound its horn when it leaves its berth. This is a warning to other maritime traffic, not just a cue to start the sail away party. There are a different number of blasts depending on what the ship is doing. If you hear five or more, head to your muster station PDQ.

[Hlitner]

The situation in Port Everglades (Ft Lauderdale) is quite unique. There are a couple of high-rise Condo buildings that line Government Cut. Within these buildings there live a quite a few big fans of cruise ships and they have established a traditions of flying flags, sounding small air horns, waving, etc. Many cruise ship Captains now acknowledge that behavior by answering with their large horns. Some Captains have a lot of fun with this (and others do not) and will sometimes get into a battle of horns with their big horns versus the little air horns on the condo balconies. There is nothing in the POM to equal this...although most ships will sound their horns at least once as they leave the port.

 

Hank

[chengkp75]

Normal ship operation requires that the ship sound its horn when it leaves its berth. This is a warning to other maritime traffic, not just a cue to start the sail away party. There are a different number of blasts depending on what the ship is doing. If you hear five or more, head to your muster station PDQ.

 

Actually, there is no requirement to sound the horn when leaving the dock. There is a requirement to test the horn prior to getting underway, and this is generally done less than an hour prior. Whistle blasts are: one for changing course to starboard, two for changing course to port, and three for going astern. These are generally used these days only when radio communication between ships cannot be established, but tend to be used in verbal communication on the radio, like two Captains saying "lets pass on a one whistle". Tugboats will tend to answer directions from the pilot with whistle blasts rather than risk stepping on another transmission.

 

And the international signal for mustering is: "more than six short blasts, followed by a long blast", which is for fire or general emergency, not abandon ship as many believe. On a passenger ship, you would only hear the abandon ship signal (continued sounding of the horn) after all passengers had been loaded into the boats and were away, and this is the signal for the crew to leave their emergency stations and head to the rafts.

 

Hank is right about Ft. Lauderdale. This goes back 40 years, and some folks used to have the "house" flags of all the shipping companies, and would hoist them whenever a ship entered/left port. This was so popular with crews that the shipping companies would send replacement flags as needed to these people. Miami would probably complain about the noise.:p

[rjack22]

Here is the Royal Princess's horn