We’ve been watching the development of LED anchor and running lights for some time. Most of them have had some shortcomings, and none were approved as running lights, until recently.

That’s a 1-watt Aqua Signal anchor light in Linda’s hand. Notice that the LED at the top is inside of a prism. The prism concentrates the light.

We mounted a pair of these on Wind Horse, one at the bow and the other on top of our “mast”. For a single watt, not even measurable on most amp meters, they put out an amazing amount of light, equally as bright as our old 10-watt bulbs.

Aside from the miserly power consumption, there are some other advantages with LEDs. They last for thousands of hours, and are not subject to breaking in rough sea states.

Aqua Signal and several other manufacturers now offer approved LED running lights. So even those cruising with minimal power capacity can be well lit at night.