Mr. Anneveld's paper (24, 50) would have us believe that the effects of coriolis force on a ship may become appreciable as ship size increases. It is true that the drift angle does increase as the ship's size increases, because the coriolis force given by equation (1) increases as (length)3·5 and the resistive forces increase as (length)3 (on the assumption of geometrically similar ships and Froude scaling). However there is a fundamental flaw in his argument because equation (2) only applies to a vessel with zero forward speed. Moreover the effect of coriolis drift will also be to induce a yaw angle on the ship (because the centre of pressure is forward of the centre of gravity, where the coriolis force may be assumed to act) and this will automatically cause the helmsman or autopilot to apply starboard rudder in the northern hemisphere. This will immediately produce a force on the ship in the port direction, i.e. opposing coriolis force.