Port and starboard vessel's starboard side by green and its port side by red. Aircraft are lit in the same way. Port and starboard Port and starboard are nautical and aeronautical terms of orientation that deal unambiguously with the structure of vessels and aircraft. Their structures are largely bilaterally symmetrical, meaning they have mirror-image left and right halves if divided long-ways down the middle. One asymmetric feature is that on aircraft and ships where access is at the side, this access is usually only provided on the port side. To understand which is which, when a person is facing the bow on a
Ship model starboard side, and four on port- that were made in the sides of the ship with a sharp tool before the clay dried. It is believed that the holes are too small to pass an oar through, and thus would not be used for rowing purposes. This is hard to prove, however, because the poorly preserved state of the model and the amount of fouling that is layered on the model makes it difficult to definitively rule out this possibility. Another theory regarding the purpose of these holes suggests that “ropes for holding oars were threaded through these holes.” Ship