[22] In 1998 Australian offshore sailor Nick Moloney took on a different challenge by being the first person to windsurf unaided across the Bass Strait in a time of 22 hours. Our previous analysis of deck logs indicated that other events occurred several weeks after the initial events of July 14th and 15th. Manifold believes what he heard was connected to the disappearance of Valentich. Over the last few years, we have completed around $600 million of decommissioning works in Bass Strait, including successfully removing the Seahorse and Tarwhine facilities . The Sydney to Hobart Yacht Race passes generally east of the strait but is affected by its weather conditions. The War Zone has received a highly significant new set of documents from the U.S. Navy via the Freedom of Information Act about a series of enigmatic drone swarm events that occurred in the waters off Southern California in 2019. [16]:485. Whether there is a connection or not is unclear, but in the immediate weeks before and following the Fred Valentich encounter, a wave of strange sightings broke out across the coastlines of Tasmania and Victoria.[7]. Bass Straight is exposed to the Roaring 40s that blow across the southern coastline of Australia. Even if that had happened, the plane was designed so that it should have been able to be guided to an emergency landing. The crew allegedly claimed they could hear the sound of a plane around them, and there were even several reports of an aerial machine coming toward them. [16]:484 Oil and gas are produced from the Cretaceous-Eocene clastic rocks of the Latrobe Group, deposited with the break-up of Australia and Antarctica. Our previous coverage began with a series of drone incidents that occurred on July 15th, 2019 approximately seventy nautical miles off the east coast of San Clemente Island. As investigations widened, reports began to emerge of strange lights being seen in the area on the evening in question. As in the earlier incidents, an unidentified pleasure craft was operating in the vicinity. It doesnt take a geoscientist to work out what might happen here, when tonnes and tonnes of water, sometimes flowing at 90 centimetres a second, hit kilometre-high walls: a lot of movement - or, in technical parlance, upwelling - where deep water is forced up the canyon walls and meets the surface. are straits which separates the continents . A briefing slide states that the objects were not distinguishable by the naked eye. If you'd like some expert background on an issue or a news event, drop us a line at explainers@smh.com.au or explainers@theage.com.au. Why is Bass Strait so rough? Bass Strait and its Islands. In terms of treacherous water, its got to be up there with the most treacherous in the world.. By the time he had returned his gaze to the road, the green object was nowhere to be seen. Perhaps strangest about the incident are the reports of strange lights being in the skies over the Bass Strait. While none of the five people on board were ever located, a search of the waters did recover some minimal wreckage. This program is a FRONTLINE co-production with The New York Times and Granada Television. The exact nature of what happened in this incident was previously unknown due to heavy redactions in ship logs. Three small boats were identified nearby, with one identifying themselves as a small fishing vessel. The table below provides detailed information about the sea conditions for the next . There appeared to be a burned patch only several centimeters wide. While most of the bizarre accounts on our list are connected to the Bass Strait itself, several times, these encounters have seemingly wandered onto the mainlands. There was enough time for coastal sand dunes to form, and in some cases theyve actually been preserved, Nichol says. Whether or not there is a connection to Bruny Island womans disappearance in open to debate. Among these new incidents are previously unknown events that occurred in the early months of 2019 and were assessed by the Navy to involve intelligence collection operations. Roys son, Jason, was with his father on the evening in question. The strait also saved 1,300km (700nmi) on the voyage.[10]. As the the author explains, however, if you wait for the appropriate weather window, you can enjoy Jennings' study of the submarine topography of Bass Strait[13] described the bathymetric Bass Basin, a shallow depression approximately 120km (70mi) wide and 400km (250mi) long (over 65,000km2[25,000sqmi] in area) in the centre of Bass Strait, a maximum depth is the channel between Inner Sister Island and Flinders Island, which navigation charts indicate reaches 155m (510ft). Monnik noted that in recent years it has become more common for criminals to use one or more drones as a canary to assess the defenses of a target. Although many questions remain about these incidents, one thing is clear. These new documents leave little doubt in that regard. The stories of the ancient world made the whirlpool into a much more deadly threat. More than 100 yachts, from small two-person boats to 30-metre super maxis, will compete this year, battling it out from Sydney down to Constitution Dock in Hobart via Bass Strait. Alinta owns a submarine gas pipeline, delivering natural gas to large industrial customers near George Town, as well as the Powerco gas network in Tasmania. Indigenous Australians crossed into Tasmania via the Bassian Plain tens of thousands of years ago. 8 The Loina Incident. The documents include unprecedentedly detailed briefing materials and photographs from more than a half dozen incidents. Within the western hemisphere, drones have been used by non-state criminal actors in Mexico both as means of smuggling and as weapons of war. Deck logs further revealed that radiofrequency data was captured from the drones during the incident. Bass Strait was once not a body of water. These features form sills separating Bass Basin from the adjacent ocean basins. Although an image of one of the drones is hard to identify in the slide, a caption describes the objects as Quadcopter style UAS.. It is 22 kilometres (14 mi) wide at its narrowest point, and is considered one of the most dangerous and unpredictable waters in the world. [6] Tasman was on a mission to find the Southern Continent, not more islands, so he abruptly turned away to the east and continued his continent hunting. Bass Strait is relatively narrow, says Nichol. [12], Despite the strait's difficult waters, it provided a safer and less boisterous[clarification needed] passage for ships on the route from Europe or India to Sydney in the early 19th century. We had eight people inside [the hull of the boat] with water up to our knees discussing what the next plan would be, he said. Hence, The Bosphorus strait is of great significance. Carbonate sandwaves in Bass Strait. Though there are relatively few details, a briefing slide describes that multiple drones were observed, with some coming as close as 200 yards (closest point of approach; CPA) to the ships bow. Strong currents between the Antarctic-driven southeast portions of the Indian Ocean and the Tasman Sea's Pacific Ocean waters provide a strait of powerful, wild storm waves. The domestic sea route is serviced by two Spirit of Tasmania passenger vehicle ferries, based in Devonport, Tasmania. It is somewhat dangerous due to rocky and narrow passages, tricky currents and winds along the way but it is sheltered from major open ocean storms. It has an average depth of just 60 metres, presenting risks to less experienced sailors who are used to navigating in deep ocean waters. Forty miles into its Bass Strait nightmare, Midnight Rambler was confronted with a situation that could easily have ended its race. Youve got waves colliding with your currents, says Nichol, and thats where you get very steep, very dangerous waves forming. 28. Thats why, while Oxleys crew were expecting strong winds, they were surprised by just how strong they were. East Coast of the United States this year. And they all affect what happens on its surface. I struggled to make my way into the shower as the ship listed . Why the Taiwan issue is so dangerous. In short, there was nothing to indicate that she had been planning on leaving.[6]. Footage of enormous waves has been captured in Australia's Bass Strait, with severe weather meaning that the Spirit of Tasmania ferry company has stopped all crossings through the Strait. The ominous reputation of the Bass Strait goes back to its very discovery in 1797, when the vessel Sydney Cove, . In 1978, one of the most famous UFO incidents in Australian history occurred over Bass Strait. why is bass strait so dangerous - gurawski.com Bass Strait - the body of water between Tasmania & mainland Australia Bass Strait | Race Record & Form | Racing Post It is 22 kilometres wide at its narrowest point and is considered to be one of the most dangerous and unpredictable waters in the world. The plane crashed into Bass Strait in the middle of the night and many character's lives were put at risk, with some drowning. The winds get funnelled through . Notably, the public affairs statement characterizes the behavior of the drones as dangerous, and not in accordance with the rules of the road or internationally recognized maritime customs.. The first windsurfer crossing was in 1982 by Mark Paul and Les Tokolyi. Fast replacing the Somalian coast as the piracy hotspot, the Gulf of Guinea has become one of the most dangerous places to go sailing. Almost a year following the disappearance of the Miss Hobart airliner, another plane, the Loina, would vanish while traveling from Melbourne to Tasmania. Pirates here mainly target tankers . The Bass Strait separates Tasmania from the Australian mainland. An email dated July 14, 2019, sent while the incident was in progress, stated that there was a pause between periods of UAS activity. Exactly a month later in Hobart, a taxi driver was suddenly forced to slam on his breaks due to a strange green glow in the middle of the road. . To get a sense of how frequently drone swarms are occurring in recent years, we recently spoke with DroneSec, a drone cybersecurity firm based in Melbourne. However the alternative, using Drake's. Please try again later. 6. In our initial investigation, public affairs officials from the Navy, Coast Guard, and Federal Bureau of Investigations all either declined to comment or referred our questions to the Department of Defenses spokesperson handling the unidentified aerial phenomenon (UAP) issue. bass strait can be one of the roughest stretches of ocean in the world. Also, the strait has international commercial shipping traffic, as well as fishing ferries of both private and public organizations. He reported that the strong south westerly swell and the tides and currents suggested that the island was in a channel linking the Pacific and southern Indian Ocean. The Straits have commercial and strategic importance. Even more dangerous may be when the system is being pushed too hard; clipped signals are more damaging than "clean" signals, because they contain more high frequency content in the dangerous frequency range. so a higher than normal number of incidents can only to be expected. What can happen in Bass Strait continues to weigh on psyches and race plans even if it may technically not all be transpiring in Bass Strait. It also indicates that the UAS incident continued after the Bass Strait departed the area. It also states that communication was never established with the nearby pleasure craft, though a standard UAS warning script was read over the radio. Two years earlier in 1942, an Australian fighter pilot took his plane over the Bass Strait after orders to investigate reports of strange lights made by fishermen. The two larger reserves, Flinders and Zeehan, extend mostly outside of the Bass Strait area. The widest opening is about 350km (220mi) between Cape Portland on the northeastern tip of Tasmania and Point Hicks on the Australian mainland. . Does Bass Strait still produce oil? The body of water between Tasmania and mainland Australia is called Bass Strait.. It's about 300kms or so from the Surf Coast on the Great Ocean Road in Victoria (the mainland) to get over to Tasmania, so it's a fair distance and a bit too far for a casual swim, although some people have kayaked across (hopping from island to island along the way, the biggest gap is about 60kms). 3rd ed. The exact duration of the incident is less clear, though the timeline indicates drones were spotted over a period of about four and a half hours. Briefing slides can now fill some of these gaps. The first humans arrived in Tasmania around 40,000 years ago. The western field, known as the Otway Basin, was discovered in the 1990s offshore near Port Campbell. Your buddies will want to blame fishing pressure. 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