Boatnerd Discussion Forum

Depending on the range lights (markers) the further away you are the more they help. When you get up close they can be so close together that you see just one light. You can best see them and how they work from out on the water.

After reviewing some of the pictures I took while at the Edison Inn, the ships must be quite a distance and to the West from the "range markers" at the mouth of the river in order to have them line up together like the gun sight mentioned in a prior post.

Just like the rear and front sights of a gun. The closet range light being the rear sight, then you line it up with the front sight, the second range light. The steering pole aids in this process.

Yes. Zoom in to the top left of this on-line chart and you should see the Thomas Edison Inn and the Range Lights to the south. Note how they line up with the center of the channel heading in from the Lake

http://www.charts.noaa.gov/OnLineViewer/14852.shtml

The lights are separated by distance and height, and the object is for the ships captain to steer his ship so that the lights are lined up above one another. Range lights are used instead of regular lighthouses in cases where there is a very narrow channel that has to be approached in a certain way as to not risk the grounding of ships and loss of cargo and lives.


Would this be the correct way they are used on the river?

Those are range lights for ships coming down bound to line up on.

Hello, I recently stayed at the Thomas Edison Inn and noticed two large stone/brick structures just to the South of the Inn near the shore by the condos on the river that have two large orange vertical stripes at the top, What are they for, radar reflectors for the passing ships? Thanks, Steve