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
Sea Witch (container ship) front of them. Initially assuming there had been an explosion on "Esso Brussels", the fireboat began to pour water onto the ship from its starboard bow, keeping their ship upwind and upcurrent from the smoke and flames now heading towards the Verrazano-Narrows Bridge. Following the inferno as it proceeded under the bridge and into Gravesend Bay, "Fire Fighter" maneuvered to a new position along the side of "Esso Brussels" and those aboard caught their first sight of the fully involved hull of "Sea Witch" and realized that there were actually two vessels involved in the fire instead of just one.