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Tacking or coming about is a sailing maneuver by which a sailing craft (sailing vessel, ice boat, or land yacht), whose next destination is into the wind, turns its bow toward and through the wind so that the direction from which the wind blows changes from one side of the boat to the other, allowing progress in the desired direction. [1]
A tack is the windward side of a sailing craft (side from which the wind is coming while under way)—the starboard or port tack. Generally, a craft is on a starboard tack if the wind is coming over the starboard (right) side with sails on port (left) side. Similarly, a craft is on a port tack if the wind is coming over the port (left).
Boats on a port tack shall keep clear of boats on starboard tack (Rule 10). When boats are on the same tack and overlapped, the boat to windward (the boat closest to the wind) shall keep clear of a leeward boat (Rule 11). When boats are on the same tack and not overlapped, the boat that is astern shall keep clear of the boat ahead. (Rule 12).
With tacking to windward carrying these risks, in some situations shipmasters considered it quicker and safer to travel upwind by executing a series of jibes, turning the vessel across the wind through 270 degrees rather than through the 90 degrees of a tack. This, however, would result in considerable ground lost to leeward with each jibe.
Farther aft than the beam; a relative bearing of greater than 90 degrees from the bow; e.g. "two points abaft the beam, starboard side" would describe "an object lying 22.5 degrees toward the rear of the ship, as measured clockwise from a perpendicular line from the right side, center, of the ship, toward the horizon".
Port: the left side of the ship, when facing forward (opposite of "starboard"). [1] Starboard: the right side of the ship, when facing forward (opposite of "port"). [1] Stern: the rear of a ship (opposite of "bow"). [1] Topside: the top portion of the outer surface of a ship on each side above the waterline. [1] Underdeck: a lower deck of a ...
The starboard tack of Prince William's forecourse. The ship is close-hauled and the sail is now controlled by the tack rather than the sheet.. The tack of a square-rigged sail is a line attached to its lower corner. [1]
Port and starboard are nautical terms for watercraft and spacecraft, referring respectively to the left and right sides of the vessel, when aboard and facing the bow (front). Vessels with bilateral symmetry have left and right halves which are mirror images of each other.