by Capt. Flak » Tue Jan 13, 2009 10:41 am
Our club in Jacksonville, Florida has a deaf sailor. His name is Baron Bremer and he just finished 2nd overall in our championship series. He is very good and knows the rules well and he will most always do his turns when he makes a foul with out having to tell him. But if he does not realize he committed a foul, you just have to tap him or wave at him and give him a hand signal to do a turn.
For the starts, he uses a stop watch that he velcros to his TX. We let him push the start tape and he puts his hand on the speaker to feel the sound and synchronizes his stop watch to the tape. He is very rarely OCS.
It has taken some folks time to get used to him, but most of us know him well and if you are not near him when you need to get his attention, we just yell down the line until someone is close enough to him to give him a tap or a nudge.
Dick Reinke is also hard of hearing and has started using a stop watch as well.
So long as everyone is aware of the guys that can't hear you, it works out fine.
As for guys using iPods while sailing, I have not experienced any problems with it. Most of the guys I know who do it, don't turn them up so loud that they can't hear what is going on. They just like a little mood music to help relax them or help them shut out the chatter so they can focus on their boat. I find they sometimes are more focused on their boat and what is going on on the water than some who are chatting a little too much instead of watching their boats.
I guess until I get holed by a guy using an iPod, I am not going to worry about it so much.
Now if you want to talk about people on their cell phone while driving...[:(!]
Joe Walter #24