US Vessel Flag Question

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cyberbadger
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US Vessel Flag Question

Post by cyberbadger » Sun Jun 18, 2017 4:48 am

So, I read the etiquette I could find online on flags on boats and I can't answer a question.

So here is the motivation... the Original 1913-era Nyitra that my grandfather had ran a Hungarian flag on the stern.

I would like to also run a Hungarian flag , but I want to pay proper respect because it is a US(Ohio) vessel, and anywhere it goes with be the US. Lots of stuff talks about masts and proportions. And guests aboard ships, and courtesy flags. This is what I want to be able to run: a 2'x3' US Yacht Ensign (which from what I read is an acceptable substitute for the US Flag) and a 2'x3' Hungarian Flag off of the stern railing. I want to give the US respect and fly the US Yacht Ensign flag higher then the Hungarian flag.

My question is how much higher should the US Yacht Ensign flag be then the Hungarian flag?

I have no permanent mast. Usually the Boiler smokestak is highest. Otherwise it will be a night all around light on a temporary "mast".

Ideas?

-CB
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Re: US Vessel Flag Question

Post by RGSP » Sun Jun 18, 2017 9:09 am

Your own country flag, or ensign, should go onto a short staff at the stern of the vessel. Nothing else should go onto the same staff or near it.

If you're visiting a different country, the above should stay as it is, and the flag of the country you're in should be flown from the yard arm of the mainmast. Any club burgee or house flag should go in the same place except to starboard rather than port.

If the vessel doesn't have a mast, then flying house flags or burgees from the jack staff (right on the bow) is acceptable. It's regarded as naff to fly more than one, so choose which you like best. The country flag you want to fly has no legal status, so you can regard it as either a house flag or a burgee.

That's all from memory, and I wouldn't like to swear to every detail, but I think it's right, and I think flag etiquette in the States is much the same, though more often ignored. (You can be fined £500 for flying anything other than the red ensign on the ensign staff here, with a few exceptions such as members of the Royal Yacht Squadron and a few other clubs who can fly defaced white or blue ensigns.)
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Re: US Vessel Flag Question

Post by cyberbadger » Mon Jun 19, 2017 12:46 am

How about this approach based on your comments.

The nav lights give you the bow. Railing is rounded, not quite as much as in the picture.

Jack staff yellow X for Hungarian flag or SBA flag. (Or both, because I'm naff enough:)

Yellow circle for short staff position for US Ensign.

Still do I have to fly the US Ensign higher right, how much?


-CB
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RGSP
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Re: US Vessel Flag Question

Post by RGSP » Mon Jun 19, 2017 8:31 am

If they're flown in those positions, on short-ish staffs, I don't think the heights matter according to marine etiquette. For land-based flag flying on tall poles, the relative heights would matter, but I haven't a clue about by how much or other details.

There are suggested sizes for ensigns which scale with boat length, but they are only suggestions, and very big ensigns just look silly on a small boat. Very small ones just look like toys. In theory house-flags, personal flags and burgees ought to be smaller than the ensign (American flag in your case), and club burgees are often quite small, but I wouldn't worry about sizes much: fly what you've got.
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Re: US Vessel Flag Question

Post by cyberbadger » Mon Jun 19, 2017 6:29 pm

Thanks RGSP! :D

Minor th
RGSP wrote:In theory house-flags, personal flags and burgees ought to be smaller than the ensign (American flag in your case
Sorry US Yacht Ensign not US Ensign. From what I've read this is an acceptable substitution in the US.

The lakes I have been at or frequented recreational boaters rarely have flags of any kind so is new. But I never have had a boat that was as personally important before enough to warrant it in my mind...

-CB
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Re: US Vessel Flag Question

Post by cyberbadger » Thu Jun 22, 2017 2:50 am

Well heres what I flew today.

Image

Image

-CB
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Re: US Vessel Flag Question

Post by Bob Cleek » Thu Jun 22, 2017 6:51 pm

Sorry to say, there is no proper option for flying the Hungarian ensign on your boat in US waters. A foreign ensign is only flown as a "courtesy" flag from the main yard or spreader, as described above.

Similarly, although lots of people fly so-called "yacht ensigns" (the US ensign with an anchor on the field, properly called the "yacht signal," this is not currently employed as anything but an affectation by those who are unaware. A documented US flagged vessel must fly the national ensign. Undocumented vessels follow the same protocol: for a power vessel without a gaff boom, it's flown from a staff on the stern.

The "yacht signal" was formerly recognized for use by American-flagged yachts (non-commercial vessels) and flown from the signal halyard to indicate to the customs officers ashore that the vessel, having just made port, was a yacht and therefore exempt from certain customs procedures in effect back in the old days. Today, the "yacht ensign," as much as it's flown in place of the US ensign, really has no more official status, nor place in proper flag use than "cocktail" or "battle axe" is aboard signals.
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Re: US Vessel Flag Question

Post by cyberbadger » Thu Jun 22, 2017 7:22 pm

Bob Cleek wrote: Today, the "yacht ensign," as much as it's flown in place of the US ensign, really has no more official status, nor place in proper flag use than "cocktail" or "battle axe" is aboard signals.
It's has no official status yes, but as since it has retired it has earned a defacto status because of all those vessels who have flown it. If laws aren't enforced then those in authority loose control of the matter.

We have something like this in Ohio with car license plates because technically in Ohio you need a front license plate by law. 98% of state and local police don't enforce it. There are weird pockets sometimes where 1 city will decided to enforce it for a while. It doesn't hold out for very long.

I will be flying the Hungarian flag as a house/club flag(starboard bow) as RGSP suggests w/ the US yacht ensign stern at some point - until I get fined which I doubt will happen. It will make a good story if I do. :lol:

I figure I have done my due diligence in the mater, namely make sure I am respecting the US flying the US yacht ensign.

Interestingly I am at presently considering getting Hungarian citizenship for an unrelated reason, (Dual USA, Hungarian) I should be able to fly the Hungarian flag as a courtesy flag for myself. :lol:

-CB
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Re: US Vessel Flag Question

Post by Bob Cleek » Thu Jun 22, 2017 11:21 pm

Well, you were in better shape on the yacht "ensign" than I thought off the top of my head. I looked it up on Wikipedia. Three states have even enacted legislation recognizing it in their borders. Here's from Wikipedia:

A modification of the national flag and ensign but with a fouled anchor in a circle of thirteen stars in the canton, was created by Act of Congress in August 1848 as a flag to be used by licensed U.S. yachts. The design was recommended by the New York Yacht Club in 1849.[10] Yachts eligible for the license were initially 20 net tons and over (later reduced to 15 net tons) and otherwise eligible to be enrolled as a US vessel; the license allowed the yacht to proceed from port to port without the formality of clearing customs. The 1848 act used the word 'signal' to describe the flag that a licensed yacht would use to identify herself, and use of this flag was required by all licensed yachts ("All such licensed yachts shall use a signal of the form, size, and colors prescribed by the Secretary of the Navy."). The Secretary of the Navy approved a modification of "the American Ensign" as the signal, and Treasury Decision No. 2727 (March 24, 1876) issued by the Treasury Department confirmed that the flag was to be used as an ensign ("Licensed yachts are required by law to use the American ensign prescribed by the Secretary of the Navy."), and its use as an ensign was reiterated in Treasury Decision 9426 of June 11, 1889 (referring to the "yacht ensign"). While formally licensed yachts were legally required to fly this modification of the national ensign, unlicensed American yachts also started flying this flag as their ensign, too, and eventually the U.S. Navy confirmed that it recognized this practice for all American yachts. In 1939, the Secretary of the Navy approved the ruling of the Judge Advocate General of the Navy "...that a ship of the Navy should return a dip made by a yacht flying the yacht ensign and that the yacht ensign may properly be made the object of a hand salute to be rendered on boarding or leaving a yacht."

"The legal requirement for licensed yachts to fly the Yacht Ensign that was part of United States statute (46 U.S.C. section 109) was repealed by the Vessel Documentation Act of 1980 (Public Law 96–594), which removed several legal provisions pertaining to the by-then very rare category of "licensed yachts" and treated all documented recreational vessels the same. Nevertheless, owing to its long usage by all U.S. yachts, as well as the fact that the freedom-from-clearance privilege first extended to "licensed yachts" in 1848 had long since been extended to all American pleasure craft regardless of whether they are federally documented or state numbered (see 19 U.S.C. sec. 1441), the yacht ensign is widely flown by many U.S. yachts and pleasure boats in U.S. waters today, continuing a tradition that dates back to the mid-nineteenth century.[11][12] The states of Arkansas,[13] Maryland,[14] and Washington[15] have each adopted flag protocols which provide that the U.S. ensign "and the U.S. Yacht Ensign, with a canton of 13 stars, are interchangeable on all types of recreational vessels while in national waters." Similarly, the United States Power Squadrons' guide to flags and flag etiquette, prepared in consultation with the Coast Guard, Coast Guard Auxiliary, New York Yacht Club, and others, provides that the Yacht Ensign may be flown as the ensign by American recreational boats of all types and sizes instead of the national ensign in domestic waters, but that the ordinary national ensign should be worn in international or foreign waters."

There's still no place to fly the Hungarian ensign properly on a regular basis, given that you want to comply with proper flag protocol. The US Navy regulations provide that when honors are being afforded a foreign nation, such as during gun salutes, the national (not naval) ensign of the foreign government is to be flown at the main truck. (The top of the tallest mast.) That's about as close as it gets.

As for the yacht ensign, I guess the weight of custom seems to have overwhelmed the regulations. Still and all, real mariners consider the yacht ensign the province of water skiers and pontoon boaters!
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Re: US Vessel Flag Question

Post by Mike Cole » Sat Jun 24, 2017 2:04 pm

No matter whichever flags you fly, keep the SBA burgee flying!!

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