"BF Lake" wrote:

You can intercept traffic in a general sense, to stop it from getting where
it is going. Like contraband cargo in a ship trying to run a blockade.
But first you have to do some trigonometry and figure out your course and
speed to make the intercept of the blockade runner. ie get to the point of
intercept along his future track that you can get to at your speed. The
more speed you have, the less lead angle you need for your "course to
intercept" and the sooner you can make the intercept. (generally speaking)

I don't know about ships, but in the air humans excel at judging
angles (e.g: fancy trig calculations not required).

What about a night encounter when you have him on radar but don't know if he
is friend or foe and the rules of engagement are that you can shoot at foes
because it you don't , the foe will kill you first , ie as in wartime.

Again, not sure about ships but the F-101B had a 100K candlepower
spotlight installed just below the RO's cockpit, port side, for
closeup visual identification of potential intruders. Nowadays,
spotlights and/or NVG's are used for the same purpose.

-Mike Marron