ORBCOMM has successfully launched six AIS-equipped satellites (a Coast Guard Concept Demonstration satellite and five Quick Launch satellites) after the Cosmos 3M rocket carrying the company’s payload blasted off at 10:36am Moscow time (06:36 GMT) from Kapustin Yar, in the Astrakhan Region, on June 19. The satellites are equipped with Automatic Identification System (AIS) technology to receive and report transmissions from AIS-equipped maritime vessels from anywhere within the satellite coverage area, information which is expected to be of major interest to authorities interested in Long Range Identification and Tracking (LRIT) in the marine domain. ORBCOMM says it intends to market this AIS data to US and international coast guards and government agencies, as well as to companies whose businesses require ship tracking and other navigational activities. These satellites represent the first stage of a multi-year satellite upgrade plan, which ORBCOMM says now makes it the only satellite company providing worldwide commercial AIS data services.
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In related news INMARST has launched their third INMARSAT-4 satellite. Maritime Executive tells us:
The satellite was launched on a Proton Breeze M rocket from the Baikonur Cosmodrome in Kazakhstan at 11.43pm BST on 18th August (4.43am 19th August, local time). Inmarsat’s tracking station in Fucino, Italy was able to track the satellite while it was still coupled to the Breeze M launch vehicle. Launch provider ILS confirmed successful spacecraft separation at 8.46am BST on 19th August.
The satellite is the third in the I-4 constellation, concluding a decade of development and a $1.5 billion investment. The current constellation of two Inmarsat-4 satellites delivers mobile broadband services to 85 per cent of the world’s landmass, covering 98 per cent of the world’s population. The third I-4 will complete the global coverage for Inmarsat’s broadband services.
Andrew Sukawaty, CEO and Chairman of Inmarsat, said: “The Inmarsat-4s are the world’s most sophisticated commercial network for mobile voice and data services, and the successful launch of the third I-4 allows us to complete the global coverage for our broadband services. Once the third I-4 is operational, Inmarsat will have the only fully-funded next-generation network for mobile satellite services.”
The Maritime Executive also has an excellent newsletter which goes out weekly via email. You can subscribe to it free by following this LINK.
A big gCaptain welcome to the 2,000+ new visitors that have stopped by gCaptain.com this week. The reason for the influx? Our CEO, Captain John Konrad, wrote an article on AIS technology for the venerable magize SAIL. To read the article you will have to visit your local newstand and flip to page 64 of the magazine’s May 2008 Issue… but if it’s the information you’re after, John has shared most of it already with Panbo.com’s editor Ben Ellison, click HERE to read that post now.
HD-SF.com has this chart of ships transiting San Francisco harbor on April 2nd. They write:
Animation of ship traffic on San Francisco bay, April 2nd 2008. You can clearly see the tourist boats making round trips to the Golden Gate Bridge and ferries bouncing back and forth from the city. You can also view a real time map of the ships on the bay and a cumulative map of 30 days ship traffic.
Being technologically oriented ship drivers we are easily excited by new web sites that combine these interests. Having worked closely with web based AIS (Digital Seas, EarthNC, ActiveCaptain, VslTrax… to name a few) providers during the Cosco Busan incident we are also increasingly becoming interested in digital ship tracking technology so to say we were excited to learn about the new and innovative AIS site Hi-Def San Francisco would be, well, an understatement. We will be sure to bring you more information on this site as details emerge but till that time enjoy the above image titled “30 Days of SF bay traffic“.
NetworkWorld.com is reporting that the US Air Forces is looking to artificial intelligence for controlling aricraft. Automated ATC - now there’s a concept. Here’s an excerpt: “DARPA says the artificial intelligence software will learn by assembling knowledge from different sources-including generating knowledge by reasoning. According to a Military & Aerospace item, such software has to combine limited observations with subject expertise, general knowledge, reasoning, and by asking what-if questions.”
As a private pilot, I just can’t wait, let alone accept that HAL will eventually sequence me in the pattern.
As a licensed mariner, I can just imagine VTS moving to such an automated system. While it’s possible for federal pencil pushers to justify such a cost saving system; it’s that kind of logic that will lead to the end of the world as we know it.
Imagine the Coast Guard doing away with all Aids to Navigation and issuing a chart plotter to each mariner, both professional and recreational. Sure, it would save money, but the results would be catastrophic.
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This post was written by Richard Rodriguez, Rescue Tug Captain, and US Coast Guard approved instructor for License Training. You can read more of his articles at the BitterEnd of the net.
Kurt Schwehr, UNH Professor and author of Kurt’s weblog point us to this quick tip;
Fred Pot pointed me to the ability of an AIS device to assist in making a VHF DSC call. Nice!
6.10 Making a DSC Call (In map mode)
To make a DSC call, the unit must be connected to a SimNet compatible
DSC VHF radio.
.
In Display Mode highlight a vessel icon then press and hold the
HOME/DSC key, the AI50 will format a Routine Individual DSC call. A
"Creating DSC Call" window opens showing the MMSI number and name of
the vessel you intend to call.
.
If this is correct and you wish to continue, press Ret MENU or > to
send the call. The "Routine DSC Call" window opens confirming that the
call has been created and sent to the VHF radio.
Earlier this week I received a request from our friend Ben Ellison at Panbo to poll our readers on the use of AIS. He was especially concerned with the upcoming release of AIS-B, vessel tracking system for boaters, and how the watch officers of large ships expected to process the increasingly large amounts of data on their radar screens. You can read that post HERE.
While writing the post I was curious about the other side of the equation namely, what do experienced boaters think about us? To answer my questions I contacted our friend Richard Rodriguez of BitterEnd blog, an experienced vessel assist Captain on one of nation’s busiest inland waterways; the Puget Sound. Here is his reply;
1) What should ships worry about when interacting with boats?
That most boats have no clue as to how to interact with ships. In the Licensing Courses I teach, I used to be surprised when folks indicated that they didn’t know ships do not guard channel 16. Ships should be afraid, very afraid, as most boats don’t have a clue, as to what to do or how to do it when they encounter a ship. Easily 1/3 of the boats I tow in the season, can’t give their Lat/Long, even though the have a GPS, let alone know about what to do related to ships. Boats usually run the other way;expect the unexpected.
2) Top 10 things I wish ships did to make boating safer?
1. Call a Securité, on channel 16, to announce a departure from norm.
2. Slowed down, when transiting congested waterways.
3. Occasionally use channel 16 when unsure of a boat’s action.
4. - 10. I’ll let readers fill in the blanks in the comment section.
3) Top 5 close calls I’ve had with ships. 1. Hiding out in the Sep Zone as I was waked by ships on either side of me.
2. Being in restricted visibility with out a radar, before I knew the rules and almost hitting a CG Cutter off the Columbia Bar.
3. Attempting to beat a 900′ USNS RoRo across the lanes. - I lost. 4. - 5. I’ll let readers fill in the blanks in the comment section.
4) Constant Bearing, Decreasing Range… how to tell if a boater is unable to get out of the way.
CBDR - now there’s a concept. Joe Blow thinks that if he bumps the throttle a few hundred RPM’s that he can beat you across the VTS lanes. He has no idea that you’re pumping 20+ kts, five to seven miles away when he starts across the (1.25 nm) lanes at 5.5 kts.
5) Lessons learned from my years boating the Puget Sound.
Conditions change - be prepared for the worst case scenario. Always have a plan B and a plan C.
Practice, practice, practice. Can you navigate with traditional tools? If you’re a sailor - can you make it to your slip under sail? When was the last time you did a man overboard drill?
By all means remember that S**T HAPPENS. If you think that something is about to happen, it is “Deemed to Exist.” Don’t put your head in the sand and boldly keep going.
We have already proclaimed our love of AIS, the technology that helps watchkeepers identify surrounding vessel traffic, but currently this technology only lets us track large ships. This is about to change. Panbo reports that the USCG has asked the FCC to expedite approval of AIS-B systems for use on boats.
What is AIS-B? The U.S. Coast Guard says;
Class B (AIS) is nearly identical to the Class A, except the Class B:
Has a reporting rate less than a Class A (e.g. every 30 sec. when under 14 knots, as opposed to every 10 sec. for Class A)
Does not transmit the vessel’s IMO number or call sign
Does not transmit ETA or destination
Does not transmit navigational status
Is only required to receive, not transmit, text safety messages
Is only required to receive, not transmit, application identifiers (binary messages)
Does not transmit rate of turn information
Does not transmit maximum present static draught
Got that?
You may have picked up on some Class B chatter over at Navagear or at Panbo questioning how effective these units will be in helping ships avoid small boats. Well Ben Ellison, electronics editor at Power & Motoryacht, Sail Magazine and Panbo.com has some questions for the ProMariner readers of gCaptain. He writes;
The bigger question is how much are they using AIS on their bridges?
Do they have good AIS target displays?
Are the displays getting too crowded as is, i.e. would there be a temptation to filter out Class B targets if they proliferate?
So with the goal of safer inland waterways for all we ask all professional mariners to answer the following poll questions then add your answers to Ben’s questions in our comments section.
So the gCaptain team has been exceptionally busy in the last few weeks and we have the Cosco Busan partially to thank. In addition to the server traffic and time spent researching the incident we were motivated by the events to embark on some new projects. You already now the good news, the successful launch of a new maritime podcast! Unfortunately, however, we also had a time consuming failure.
A little history…. Shortly after the ship allided with San Francisco’s Bay Bridge we pointed you to the amazing website BoatingSF.com. Run by Michael Slater, a former Adobe Engineer, the site uses AIS vessel tracking data taken from VHF radio antennas Michael has erected near the bay and uses this to plot ships to a live interactive map embedded on his site (LINK). The post that day, however, displayed recorded data showing the track of the Cosco Busan during her short voyage. The display was impressive and attracted a considerable amount of attention.
At this point of the story we had just finished reading an amazing article written for Geo: Magazine by John Astad, our friend from Vesseltrax. The subject of the article was Shore-Side Maritime Applications of Google Earth and discussed his ability to visualize 3d images of ships running the Houston Ship Channel. Even cooler was the ability to fly around a vessel as she moved about the bay… in real time! (LINK) So I contacted Michael and asked if he would send the data file to John for 3d conversion!
The stars seemed to be aligning until we discovered a problem (read about it here) that resulted in John not being able to convert the data for use in his program. Discouraged? Yes but in stepped a gCaptain reader who we can’t thank enough. He transposed the timestamps from regional AIS beacons and helped us create a ShipPlotter version (Disclaimer here and ShipPlotter results here) of the events. Not quite accurate but close enough for our next team to start work…
Jakota “is engaged in the development and sale of solutions aimed at the commercial sector and public services, as well as the field of research and science. We supply solutions for tracking, fleet management, positioning and security- and alarm systems.” Translated; they make the best 3d ship graphing websites on the planet. They also provide amazing tools for tracking fleets of ships that are visually stunning, effective and well thought out.
You ask, how did we find Jakota? We asked our friends in silicon valley to search for a company that provides AIS vessel tracking systems that first, have visually attractive solutions, second use the latest tools of web 2.0. The overwhelming response was “Check out Digital-Seas.com“.
Fast forward through the time changes, international calling codes and German accents… we finally got in touch with Lars Krueger, one of the nicest and most professional person we have met. Lars took a programmer off his job to work on our project full time… the results were stunning but the harder we work the more faulty data we found.
The bottom line… we worked hard, had fun, met some amazing people and built relationships for the future. The final result is not 100% accurate and was compressed to meat BoatingSF’s needs but still looks amazing (you should see the original!!) We also started on a new project, global AIS and vessel tracking… but that’s for another post. In the meantime, if your a marine superintendent Lars is a person you need to know. If you’re a mariner interested in tracking ships so you don’t have to spend days in sitting in the union hall… Digital-Seas is the website you will know.
Many thanks to all who helped and stay tuned for more on the amazing people and products we met while working on this project. For a preview visit these amazing sites;
EarthNC - Digital Chart Overlays for Google Earth!
Enough discussion… to see the Cosco Busan’s Track CLICK HERE
Note: The source of our problem was the USCG’s reluctance to release the official AIS data files. If you wish to see the amazing visualizations of Digital Seas… in full size… with accurate data… call your congressman and ask for the file to be released to the public.
This post was written by Richard Rodriguez, Rescue Tug Captain, and US Coast Guard approved instructor for License Training. You can read more of his articles at the 
