Peter Hedley on Navigation

Lisa: Could you tell me a bit more about the buoyage system in The Solent and then how it changed? You mentioned that, did they used to be gas powered?

Yes. They had a gas lantern on them, and they had these big bottles, gas bottles which stood about five feet six high and very, very heavy and they were put into pockets on the buoys. They had three to each buoy and that was an awful job for the crews of the ships to service but now, when we eventually changed over to the solar system it was only a matter of putting the solar panels on and the batteries and of course the lights and now that’s changed again since my time, with these LEDs who use much less power and well, I’m not up to date with it but they wouldn’t need such big batteries etc. that we had to put in.

Lisa: And, how many are there going through The Solent?

Oh through The Solent, overall there were 360 buoys that Trinity House looked after so through The Solent, the main channels of The Solent are marked by Trinity buoys.

The ones that you see that go up Southampton Water, they’re under local authority, ABP, they look after those, as do the ones in Portsmouth Harbour, they come under the Admiralty so Trinity House just marks the main channels and I think they’ve cut back on that 360 number now that I dealt with and that was back in the 1980s.