NOAA ENCŪ

NATIONAL OCEANIC AND ATMOSPHERIC ADMINISTRATION

US5TPAJE - GULF INTRACOASTAL WATERWAY - SAINT JOSEPH SOUND


INDEX:

NOTE A
AIDS TO NAVIGATION
POLLUTION REPORTS
CAUTION - USE OF RADIO SIGNALS (LIMITATIONS)
SUPPLEMENTAL INFORMATION
CAUTION - TEMPORARY CHANGES
WARNING - PRUDENT MARINER
ADDITIONAL INFORMATION
AUTHORITIES
ADMINISTRATION AREA
BROADCASTS OF MARINE WEATHER FORECASTS AND WARNINGS BY MARINE RADIOTELEPHONE STATIONS
CAUTION - DREDGED AREAS
CAUTION - QUALITY OF BATHYMETRIC DATA
CAUTION - SMALL CRAFT
CAUTION - SUBMARINE PIPELINES AND CABLES
CAUTION - SURVEY PLATFORMS
CAUTION - USACE HYDROGRAPHIC SURVEYS
CAUTION - WARNING CONCERNING LARGE VESSELS
COLREGS DEMARCATION LINES
HURRICANES AND TROPICAL STORMS
INTRACOASTAL WATERWAY AIDS
MINERAL DEVELOPMENT STRUCTURES
NOAA WEATHER RADIO BROADCASTS
RACING BUOYS
RADAR REFLECTORS
WATER LEVELS, CURRENTS, AND TIDES
COMMENTS REQUESTED


NOTES:

NOTE A
Navigation regulations are published in Chapter 2, U.S. Coast Pilot 5. Additions or revisions to Chapter 2 are published in the Notice to Mariners. Information concerning the regulations may be obtained at the Office of the Commander, 7th Coast Guard District in Miami, Florida, or at the Office of the District Engineer, Corps of Engineers, in Jacksonville, Florida. Refer to charted regulation section numbers.


AIDS TO NAVIGATION
Consult U.S. Coast Guard Light List for supplemental information concerning aids to navigation.


POLLUTION REPORTS
Report all spills of oil and hazardous substances to the National Response Center via 1-800-424-8802 (toll free), or to the nearest U.S. Coast Guard facility if telephone communication is impossible (33 CFR 153).


CAUTION - USE OF RADIO SIGNALS (LIMITATIONS)
Limitations on the use of radio signals as aids to marine navigation can be found in the U.S. Coast Guard Light Lists and National Geospatial-Intelligence Agency Publication 117. Radio direction-finder bearings to commercial broadcasting stations are subject to error and should be used with caution.


SUPPLEMENTAL INFORMATION
Consult U.S. Coast Pilot 5 for important supplemental information.


CAUTION - TEMPORARY CHANGES
Temporary changes or defects in aids to navigation are not indicated. See Local Notice to Mariners.


WARNING - PRUDENT MARINER
The prudent mariner will not rely solely on any single aid to navigation, particularly on floating aids. See U.S. Coast Guard Light List and U.S. Coast Pilot for details.


ADDITIONAL INFORMATION
Additional information can be obtained at www.nauticalcharts.noaa.gov.


AUTHORITIES
Hydrography and topography by the National Ocean Service, Coast Survey with additional data from the Corps of Engineers, Geological Survey, and U.S. Coast Guard.


ADMINISTRATION AREA
The entire extent of this ENC cell falls within the limits of an Administration Area. This area covers land, internal waters, and territorial sea. The territorial sea is a maritime zone over which the United States exercises sovereignty extending to the airspace as well as to its bed and subsoil. For more information, please refer to the Coast Pilot.


BROADCASTS OF MARINE WEATHER FORECASTS AND WARNINGS BY MARINE RADIOTELEPHONE STATIONS
CITY                STATION     FREQUENCY         DAILY BROADCAST-EST     SPECIAL WARNING
St Petersburg, FL   NMA-21      2670.000 kHz      9:20 AM, 10:20 PM       *On receipt
                                 157.100 MHz      8:00 AM, 6:00 PM        *On receipt
Tampa, FL           WFA         2466.000 kHz      7:00 AM, 7:00 PM        On receipt and on 2550.000 kHz even hours
                    KUZ-385      161.600 MHz      7:00 AM, 7:00 PM

*Preceded by announcement on 156.800 MHz
Distress calls for small craft are made on channel 16 (156.800 MHz) VHF.


CAUTION - DREDGED AREAS
Improved channels are subject to shoaling, particularly at the edges.


CAUTION - QUALITY OF BATHYMETRIC DATA
The areas represented by the object M_QUAL (Quality of Data) are approximate due to generalizing for clarity. Caution is advised, particularly for nearshore navigation or voyage planning. M_QUAL represents areas of uniform quality of bathymetric data. The CATZOC (Category of Zone of Confidence in Data) attribute of M_QUAL provides an assessment of the overall zone of confidence.


CAUTION - SMALL CRAFT
Small craft should stay clear of large commercial and government vessels even if small craft have right-of-way. All craft should avoid areas where the skin divers flag, a red square with a diagonal white stripe, is displayed.


CAUTION - SUBMARINE PIPELINES AND CABLES
Additional uncharted submarine pipelines and submarine cables may exist within the area of this chart. Not all submarine pipelines and submarine cables are required to be buried, and those that were originally buried may have become exposed. Mariners should use extreme caution when operating vessels in depths of water comparable to their draft in areas where pipelines and cables may exist, and when anchoring, dragging or trawling. Covered wells may be marked by lighted or unlighted buoys.


CAUTION - SURVEY PLATFORMS
Survey platforms, signs, pipes, piles, and stakes, some submerged, may exist along the maintained channels. Piles and platforms are not charted where they interfere with a light symbol.


CAUTION - USACE HYDROGRAPHIC SURVEYS
USACE conducts hydrographic surveys to monitor navigation conditions. These surveys are not intended to detect underwater features. Undetected features hazardous to surface navigation may exist in federal channels, as might shoaling, particularly along the edges of channels. For more information visit https://navigation.usace.army.mil/Survey/Hydro/ .


CAUTION - WARNING CONCERNING LARGE VESSELS
The "Rules of the Road" state that recreational boats shall not impede the passage of a vessel that can navigate only within a narrow channel or fairway. Large vessels may appear to move slowly due to their large size but actually transit at speeds in excess of 12 knots, requiring a great distance in which to maneuver or stop. A large vessel's superstructure may block the wind with the result that sailboats and sailboards may unexpectedly find themselves unable to maneuver. Bow and stern waves can be hazardous to small vessels. Large vessels may not be able to see small craft close to their bows.


COLREGS DEMARCATION LINES
COLREGS demarcation lines follow the general trend at the seaward high water shoreline except where charted.


HURRICANES AND TROPICAL STORMS
Hurricanes, tropical storms and other major storms may cause considerable damage to marine structures, aids to navigation and moored vessels, resulting in submerged debrisin unknown locations. Charted soundings, channel depths and shoreline may not reflect actual conditions following these storms. Fixed aids to navigation may have been damaged or destroyed. Buoys may have been moved from their charted positions, damaged, sunk, extinguished or otherwise made inoperative. Mariners should not rely upon the position or operation of an aid to navigation. Wrecks and submerged obstructions may have been displaced from charted locations. Pipelines may have become uncovered or moved.Mariners are urged to exercise extreme caution and are requested to report aids to navigation discrepancies and hazards to navigation to the nearest United States Coast Guard unit.


INTRACOASTAL WATERWAY AIDS
The U.S. Aids to Navigations System is designed for use with nautical charts, and the exact meaning of an aid to navigation may not be clear unless the appropriate chart is consulted.Aids to navigation marking the Intracoastal Waterway exhibit unique yellow symbols to distinguish them from aids marking other water-ways. When following the Intracoastal Waterway westward from the Caloosahatchee River to Anclote, FL, aids with yellow triangles should be kept on the starboard side of the vessel and aids with yellow squares should be kept on the port side of the vessel. A horizontal yellow band provides no lateral information, but simply identifies aids to navigation as marking the Intracoastal Waterway.


MINERAL DEVELOPMENT STRUCTURES
Obstruction lights and sound (fog) signals are required for fixed mineral development structures shown, subject to approval by the District Commander, U.S. Coast Guard (33 CFR 67).


NOAA WEATHER RADIO BROADCASTS
The NOAA Weather Radio stations listed below provide continuous weather broadcasts. The reception range is typically 20 to 40 nautical miles from the antenna site, but can be as much as 100 nautical miles for stations at high elevations.

Tampa Bay, FL       KHB-32      162.550 MHz
Largo, FL           KEC-38      162.450 MHz


RACING BUOYS
Racing buoys within the limits of this chart are not shown hereon. Information may be obtained from the U.S. Coast Guard District Offices as racing and other private buoys are not all listed in the U.S. Coast Guard Light List.


RADAR REFLECTORS
Radar reflectors have been placed on many floating aids to navigation. Individual radar reflector identification on these aids has been omitted from this chart.


WATER LEVELS, CURRENTS, AND TIDES
Real-time water levels, tide predictions, and tidal current predictions are available on the internet from NOAA's Center for Operational Oceanographic Products and Services (CO-OPS) at https://tidesandcurrents.noaa.gov/water_level_info.html and https://tidesandcurrents.noaa.gov/currents_info.html.


COMMENTS REQUESTED
NOAA encourages users to submit inquiries, discrepancies, or comments about this chart via NOAA's ASSIST tool at https://www.nauticalcharts.noaa.gov/customer-service/assist/.


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