A thought for ocean races
Sometimes...in fact a lot of the time, you can't hear VHF broadcasts originating out in the Gulf of the Farallones, from the GGYC race deck. I remember in 1995 I gave Shama fits because I had anchored 200 feet off the cliffs and out of the current, just outside the GG Bridge. We couldn't hear each other on VHF.
WHAT IF.....we made it a policy for the SHF that we had a "mobile station" with a VHF and a good antenna, and a cell phone, out by the Cliff House, or something?
1968 Selmer Series 9 B-flat and A clarinets
1962 Buesher "Aristocrat" tenor saxophone
Piper One Design 24, Hull #35; "Alpha"