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Bill Balme - 24 Jul 2021

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Richard Hudson - 8 Jul 2021

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Bill Balme - 7 Jul 2021

Is the NW Passage Canadian or International waters?
If the latter as is claimed by Peter, it seems to me the Canadians had no right to close it.
If Canadian, then by all means, they should be free to keep everyone out.

Whether the Northwest Passage (or parts of it) is in Canadian waters seems the crux of the issue, and the answer is that it's disputed (the Lawfare link in Daria's original post explains this well).

So it's not clear that Canada can legally control transits of the NW Passage.

While I agree that cruisers absolutely should respect the laws and customs of the places they visit, I think Peter Smith was put in a difficult situation.  
He had been in contact with the Canadian government, which had initially said that non-stop transits were acceptable ("Foreign pleasure craft exercising the right of innocent passage").

The Canadian government then reversed that and told Peter Smith six days after he left Nome, that he was not going to be allowed to transit the NW Passage ( https://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/north/new-zealand-yacht-cambridge-bay-nunavut-1.5698347 ).

Six days after leaving Nome would have put Peter a fair ways into the NW Passage (which is generally considered to start in the Bering Strait, between Alaska and Russia), somewhere along the north coast of Alaska.

From a position off the north coast of Alaska, to be told by a country that has just reversed it's decision, on allowing transit through waters that may or may not be part of that country, should one abort and head for Panama?   

Would the Panama Canal be open by the time one got there, or could it have locked down for Covid?
Would it be better to sail nonstop (in case Chile locked down) for Cape Horn instead?
Or, as a foreigner on a foreign yacht, to ask the USA for permission to stay in Alaska until Covid was over?

Again, I absolutely do agree that cruisers should respect the laws and customs of the countries they visit and 'leave a clean wake', but I think in this case, there were extenuating circumstances.  

Interestingly, we arrived in Santa Maria, Azores a few days ago, and there's this substantial expedition aluminium boat tied to one of the docks - and on closer examination I see that it's Peter Smith's Kiwi Roa!

So we invited Peter (as well as another OCC boat - Asante) over to Toodle-oo! last night for sundowners - and of course I asked Peter about his recent experience in the NWP.

He's quite clear in his own mind that the NWP is an international waterway - which the Canadians appear to be trying to annex into Canadian Territory, but that many countries - including the UK dispute.

Richard, your summary seems to be right on the money in terms of timing involved in Canada's sudden refusal of passage - and clearly was an onerous task for Peter to adhere to. Instead, he ploughed on, following all normal guidance, including twice daily contact with the Canadian authorities and made it through unscathed, with zero interaction with the locals.

It's somewhat reasonable that the Canadians have something of a say in how the passage is navigated, but it seems to me that they have zero right to prevent a boat from making the passage. The argument that the Canadian CG is exposed unnecessarily, also feel highly bogus, when one considers for example the number of boats present in the NWP compared to, for example, the number of foreign boats the New Zealand CG has to rescue on an annual basis around their international waters.

Anyway, Peter has been fined by the Canadians and is fighting it forthrightly - and is likely to gain backing from various governments that are not willing to allow Canada to quietly annex the NWP as their own territory. Good luck to him!