PART 3
It will often happen that a boat is clearly OCS, and is recalled, but her return is not detected by the race officials. She is scored accordingly, and asks for redress. Here, the odds in favour of the boat are a little better. If she can bring evidence to show that she returned, and the race committee has no evidence to the contrary, she should be reinstated1
.’
. ‘There is a considerable difference between a collective “We did not see any boat come back” from the race committee and a personal “I observed the boat for a period of time after she was identified OCS and she did not come back…” When there is doubt that a race committee has properly fulfilled its obligations and this results in a penalty to a competitor, a protest committee should resolve the matter in favour of the competitor2
Most of the appeal cases revolve around procedural mistakes made by the race committee. Even when a mistake is proved, that does not automatically mean that redress will be given, or that redress will be full reinstatement into the boat’s finishing position. WS 31 (echoed in WS 71) makes an important point, that even when there is a procedural error by the race committee, ‘a boat that realises that she was over the line is not entitled to redress, and she must comply with rule 28,1 and, if it applies, rule 30.1. If she fails to do so, she breaks rule 2 and fails to comply with the Basic Principle, Sportsmanship and the Rules.’
The recall signal comprises both flag X and the sound signal3 . ‘When the sound signal is omitted from an
individual recall, and a recalled boat in a position to hear a sound signal does not see the visual signal and does not return, she is entitled to redress4
.’ However, when the race committee makes two sound signals rather than
one with the individual recall, this was an improper action by the race committee, but a boat that is unable to see that it is flag X that is flying should not assume it to be a general recall, and if she stops racing on that basis alone, she may be at fault, and therefore debarred from redress.
In RYA 2014/2, the race committee made that mistake. The OCS boat nevertheless returned, and flag X was removed. However, two other boats believed it was a general recall, and started to return. One resumed racing when she saw that the flag was flag X, as did the other when, at her first chance to look at the committee, no flags were displayed, flag X having been removed.
‘Both boats were at fault and lost places through relying solely on the sound element of the signal, and turning back when there was no need to do so before they could see the flag signal. Rule 29.2 states that a general recall signal is the display of the First Substitute with two sounds. As that flag was not displayed, no General Recall was signalled. Until the boats could see which flag was (or was not) being displayed, they should not have acted on the assumption from the two sound signals alone that there had been a general recall.
This is different from the situation, described in WS Case 31, where flag X is displayed but no sound signal is made. In that case, there was no reason for a boat to look for a recall flag and, by continuing to race, her score was affected through no fault of her own.’
1 SC 97 2 ibid 3 RYA 2014/2 4 WS 31
RYA The Racing Rules Explained 135
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