If you are new to boating in this area, we need to give you a word of warning… It’s easy to get lost here! There are over 420 miles of navigatable waters in Chatham County alone. That’s a lot of water, so you will want to have the proper charts in your boat at all times. Charts are numbered and the number of the local chart for the Savannah area is 11512. But it’s not enough to have a chart, you need to know how to read it.

One of the best ways to learn how to read a chart is to pick up a little book, oddly named, Chart Number One. It is not a chart at all, but a book containing the legends for NOAA charts. Be aware that not all charts are NOAA charts. Sit down with that legend and your local NOAA chart and try to identify and learn as many symbols as you can on your chart.

Charts are filled with tens of thousands of pieces of information that have been collected from a myriad of sources and assembled and printed with state of the art technology. They contain, in the briefest of shorthand, information that would fill a very large book, if printed in normal verbiage. Learning to read a chart will open you mind to more information than you would get from hours of interviews with local captains.

Let’s look at chart 11512 together (you do have one, right?). Notice the chart number is conveniently written on the sides and bottom, so you don’t have to unroll the entire chart to identify it. Notice the word “Soundings” written boldly at the top. This is how the depth is measured: feet, yards, meters, or fathoms (one fathom = six feet). Notice the title block. This will contain a description of the area covered by the chart. It also identifies the projection used (Mercator, Polyconic, etc.). Now focus your attention on the Notes. Read through them and get a sense of the information contained here.

Now, get a sense of the use of color on the chart. Tan areas are land, green - marsh. Water is either white or blue. Why the difference? Look closely at the water in Wassaw Sound. Do you see the small numbers written all throughout the water section. Those numbers represent the depth at mean lower low water. Notice areas of the same general depth are surrounded by lines. These lines are drawn at 6, 12, and 18 feet intervals. Above 18 feet, the water color turns to white. From there, the isometric lines jump to intervals of 30, 60 and more feet. Lines and colors are shown on the chart to give a mariner a quick overview of the “good water”, so that he can quickly and easily plot a safe course. Look at the depths for waters you normally run. Find any shallow spots?

Now find an ATON (Aid to Navigation) symbol. Here is just a fraction of what you would know, if you knew how to read them. You would know if it is a lateral marker, an isolated danger marker, a safe-water marker, a preferred-channel marker, a range marker or an informational marker. You would know if it is a fixed beacon or a buoy. If it is a buoy, you would know if it was a nun or a can or pillar buoy. You would know its color and its number or letter. If it was a light or lighted buoy, you would know its characteristic (fixed, flashing, isophase, occulting, group occulting, quick, etc.). You would know how far the light could be seen, how high the beacon stood above the water, and the period between flashes. If it was a buoy, you would know if it had a bell, gong or whistle. And, if it had a RADAR reflector, you would know what Morse Code letter would appear on your radar screen. All this, from just a little symbol and a few cryptic letters next to it.

You are living in a boater’s paradise, my friend. The entire east coast is yours to explore, for the cost of the fuel. All you need to do, is to learn how to navigate safely. Learning to read a chart is just the beginning. Come join us for our navigation course and open up your world of exploration.

For information on obtaining free vessel safety checks, safe boating courses, Coast Guard Auxiliary membership or other recreational boating matters, contact Flotilla 10-2 through our website – www.savannahaux.com.