| TERMS | MEANING: |
|---|---|
| EARING | A small rope used to fasten the upper corners of a square sail to its yard. The outer turns of the earings, after being passed through the head cringles on the sail, are then passed beyond the lifts and rigging on the yardarm and are designed to stretch the head of the sail tight along the yard, while the remaining turns, known as inner turns, draw the sail close up to the yard and are passed within the lifts. Below the earings are the reef earings, by which the reef cringles are similarly made fast to the yard when the sail is reefed. |
| EASE, to, or EASY | A good maritime term meaning, in general, to take the pressure off. A sailing ship, on the order ‘ease her’, is luffed, or brought closer into the wind in order to reduce the wind pressure on her sails in a heavy blow; the helm in a steamship is eased by reducing the angle previously ordered, in order to slow down the rate of swing; and so on. Similarly, in sailing yachts, the sheets are eased, sometimes to take the pressure off the sail to reduce the angle of heel, at others to produce a squarer aspect of the sail to the wind. |
| EBB | The flow of the tidal stream as it recedes, from the ending of the period of slack water at high tide to the start of the period of slack water at low tide. Its period is about 6 hours, which is approximately divided into three parts, the first 2 hours being known as the first of the ebb, the middle 2 hours as the strength of the ebb, and the last 2 hours as the last of the ebb. |
| ECHO SOUNDER | An instrument based on the principle of sonar by which the depth of water can be measured. By using a vertical sonar pulse and measuring the time taken between emission of the signal and the receipt of the echo off the bottom, the depth of water can be accurately calculated. Echo sounding was developed shortly after the end of the First World War when the Anglo-French asdic was introduced as a means of locating the positions of submerged submarines, and was quickly adapted for use in marine surveys for recording soundings without the labour of the hand or deep sea lead line. It is also quicker and more accurate in recording a sounding than a sounding machine. It has since been developed for use in all types of vessels, modern echo sounders producing a continuous trace which shows the contour of the bottom beneath the vessel. Small sets, run off a battery, have been developed for use in yachts, and are claimed to be able to record a depth of as little as one fathom. |
| ECLIPTIC | From the Greek ekleipsis, disappearance, is the great circle on the celestial sphere traced out by the sun in the course of a year. It is so called because for an eclipse of the sun or moon to occur, the moon must lie on or near the ecliptic. The ecliptic intersects the celestial equator, or equinoctial, twice during the year at dates known as the equinoxes; on 21 March at the ‘first point of Aries’, which is 0° Right Ascension, and on 23 September at the ‘first point of Libra’, at 180° Right Ascension, and is furthest from the equator (23° 23? N. or S.) at the points marking the summer solstice (June) and winter solstice (December). |
| EMBARGO | A temporary arrest or injunction laid on ships or cargo to prevent their arrival or departure in time of war. An embargo can be general, affecting all ships of whatever nationality, or partial, in which only ships of certain nationalities are affected. Originally embargoes could be declared in anticipation of a declaration of war. a method used by many nations to detain ships of the enemy which might be in port. However, in the Hague Convention of 1907, a clause laid down that it was desirable that ships in an enemy port on the outbreak of war should be allowed to depart freely but did not make it binding on the belligerent. A ship stopped by embargo may not be confiscated but only detained without compensation, and must be restored to her owners after the war. It is customary today to give a respite to enemy merchant ships to leave port on the outbreak of war so that neither ship nor cargo is subject to embargo. |
| EMBARK | A verb with three meanings:(1) to put on board a vessel.
(2) to go on board a vessel, (3) of a ship, to receive on board, embarkation, the process or action of embarking. |
| ENSIGN | (1) The national flag as worn by the ships of a nation. Many countries which have navies as well as merchant ships use two ensigns, one for naval ships and one for merchant vessels. For British ships three ensigns are used, the White Ensign flown by a ship or naval shore establishment indicates a unit of the Royal Navy, the Blue Ensign is flown by naval auxiliary vessels, and the Red Ensign by vessels of the merchant navy. whose yachts above a certain tonnage may fly the White Ensign. Many yacht clubs also have approval for their yachts to fly the Blue Ensign defaced with the badge of the club in the fly. Any British vessel not naval may fly the Red Ensign, but again many yacht clubs have permission to fly this ensign defaced as above.
(2) A naval rank in the U.S. and some other navies equivalent to that of midshipman or sub-lieutenant. |
| ENTRY | The form of the fore-body of a ship under the load line as it thrusts through the sea. A ship with a slim bow is said to have a fine entry. It is in many ways the complement of run, which is the shape of the after-body of a ship in relation to the resistance it causes as it moves through the water. |
| ENTRY PORT | A large port cut in the sides of the larger sailing warships through which men entered on board the ship. They gave the opportunity to many contemporary ship designers to include elaborate carvings to embellish the port. |
| EPHEMERIS | From the Greek, a diary, an astronomical almanac in which are tabulated the predicted celestial positions of the heavenly bodies on the equinoctial system against a standard time, usually Greenwich Mean Time. The Nautical Almanac includes ephemerides of the sun, moon, and navigational planets, as well as other information of use to the nautical astronomer. |
| EQUINOCTIAL | From the Latin aequus, equal, and nox, night, the great circle on the celestial sphere in the plane of the earth’s equator, sometimes called the celestial equator. The sun is on the equinoctial on two occasions each year, these occurring on 2 1 March and 23 September, days known as the equinoxes. On these days the sun rises at 6 a.m., and sets at 6 p.m. (local time) at every place on earth. The two points of intersection of the equinoctial with the ecliptic are called the spring and autumnal equinoctial points respectively, or more usually the First Points of Aries and Libra for the spring and autumnal equinoxes. |
| ESCORT VESSEL | The generic name for ships of various types whose main employment at sea in wartime is the protection of single ships or convoys against attack by submarines, aircraft, or surface warships. The name embraces such various types of ships as trawlers fitted for antisubmarine duties, sloops, cutters, frigates, etc. |
| ESTABLISHMENT OF A PORT | The interval between the time of meridian passage of the new or the full moon and the time of the following high tide. This interval is constant for a given port and is sometimes known as the High Water Full and Change Constant (H.W.F. & C. Constant). Because the tides are governed largely by the moon, and because the time of meridian passage of the moon is later each day to the extent of about 50 minutes, it follows that if the age of the moon and the establishment of the port are known, the approximate times of high and low waters on any day may be found. If, for example, the H.W.F. & C. Constant for a given port is 3 hours 45 minutes and the age of the moon is three days, the time of the a.m. high water at the port will be 0615 approximately, i.e., 0345 + (3 x 50)min. = 0615. |
| EUGENIE | The name given to a woollen cap worn by seamen in the late 19th century in Arctic and Antarctic waters. The name originates from the caps presented by the ex-Empress Eugenie of France to every officer and man on board the Alert and Discovery during the Royal Navy’s Arctic expedition of 1875. |
| EVEN KEEL | A vessel is said to be on an even keel when she floats exactly upright in the water without any list to either side. |
| EYE | Properly speaking, the circular loop in a shroud or stay where it passes over a mast at the hounds. It is formed by splicing the ends of two ropes or wires into each other to form a loop to fit over the mast. But by extension it has come to mean any loop spliced or whipped at the end of a rope or wire, usually round a thimble. A Flemish eye was a method of making the eye in a shroud or stay by dividing the strands, knotting each part separately and then parcelling and serving. This method, though very neat, was frowned upon by all good seamen as it lacked strength where, for the safety of the ship, it was most needed. The word has other nautical meanings. The eye of the wind, or wind’s eye, is a term used to describe the exact direction from which it blows, or dead to windward. The eyes of the ship, or ‘eyes of her’ is used to describe the extreme forward end of a ship, the term being derived from the old eastern and Mediterranean custom of painting an eye on each bow so that the vessel could see where she was going. By some it is considered that the hawseholes are equivalent to the eyes in a modern ship, but this is a somewhat doubtful attempt to fit the physical fact of more modern ship construction to an older derivation. The eye of a tropical storm, the area in the centre where all is still. |
| EYE SPLICE | A loop or eye made in the end of a rope or wire by turning the end back and splicing it through the standing part, usually around a thimble, with the length of the splice served to prevent fraying and to make a neater job. |
| EYEBOLTS | Metal bolts with an eye in the end secured in various convenient places on board ship to which the blocks of purchases can be hooked or other lines secured. |