Blog Home

The U.S. Coast Guard has recently announced new efforts to reduce the number of AIS transponder errors and will be enforcing compliance with civil penalties and fines. This article looks at the issue and how you can find and correct AIS errors.

We are often asked, do commercial vessels filter out Class B AIS transmissions or at least ignore them if they see them? We can't say for all vessels but here is an article that talks about the value of all AIS for one group of fast ferries in our area - the Victoria Clippers.

The U.S. Coast Guard Navigation Center (NAVCEN) recently created a voluntary service that enables mariners to verify compliance with AIS carriage requirements.

Print is dead yet again. The National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration announced that beginning in April 2014, it will no longer print the detailed lithographic nautical charts that have been a staple of navigation since 1862. NOAA says that mariners are increasingly forgoing the paper maps in favor of easily updated electronic charts that show multifaceted information. As a final nod to paper, the agency will continue to offer printed charts as a print-on-demand service through private vendors.

This past Thursday I had the privilege of attending the America's Cup as a guest of Vesper Marine and Emirates Team New Zealand.

If you haven't seen it head over to Panbo to check out Ben Ellison's post "Vesper Marine WatchMate, still the leader in AIS collision avoidance?"

As the International Space Station circles Earth, it has been tracking individual ships crossing the seas beneath. An investigation hosted by the European Space Agency (ESA) in its Columbus module has been testing the viability of monitoring global maritime traffic from the station's orbit hundreds of miles (kilometers) above since June 2010.