The
anchor light should be well up the mast or high in the
rigging, else you'll not get your maximum visibility of it. From reading the Colregs one can see the value of what they call deck illumination, required on ships at
anchor, and this could be your spreader
lights or other
lighting.
A solution for all-round visibility, should you wish to mount the
anchor light to the mast but not place it atop the truck, is to use two
lights of 180 degree arc each. They can be mounted to either side of the mast, at the same height, and thereby offer you an almost infinite range of placement. From a distance, even a short distance, they appear as one light. You'll commonly see this on ships and tugs where the mast is quite substantial and it is otherwise impossible to get the all-round pattern required.
I'd not be anchoring where a sailboat would want to have an aircraft warning light. In another life I spent a nerve-wracking two days at Castle Island terminal in Boston, which is right in the landing path of the jets comeing into Logan International. Wondering if those 747's were going to clear the ship's masts is not a good way to get a restful sleep, regardless of the knowledge that they've been clearing them for years. All that matters is that they don't look like they're going to clear and they sure didn't sound like they cleared by much either. Deer in the headlights pretty much describes my two nights alongside.
Sin City, Liquor all day, Poker all night...Lake Mead & Channel Islands, So Cal
and be legal also. It don't have to be at the top of the mast. That is just a convenient place to put the thing and have it out of the way of other electrics.
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