Tuesday, July 01, 2008
Marine VHF Radio Mayday Calls/Ch. 16: How-to/1
As you listen to the audio clip above (a clickable movie with subtitles), be patient with the gaps which reflect the true pace of marine VHF radio mayday communications.
You'll hear how cumbersome mayday calls can be, and how important it is to describe your location whether by specific landmarks or by giving latitude and longitude coordinates from your gps or NOAA chart -- that is, assuming you still have the presence of mind to use and read them.
If you can't give a clear and accurate description of where you are, response time to your emergency becomes that much longer, rescue or assistance operations that much more involved.
At a minimum, the Coast Guard VHF watchstander who responds to your call may be quite far away; the closest possible responder, on the other hand, say a power boat just a mile or so off, won't know where you are unless you can describe your location accurately.
Fail to give an accurate description of your location and you'll have to wait for the Coast Guard to triangulate your position...when all the while some nearby boater could have provided aid sooner.
Note the specific loran coordinates, a since outmoded technology, the captain provides.
Note too how the radio call is picked up first by an overflying Coast Guard aircraft, after which the airmen yield control of the mayday to the watchstander at Coast Guard station Chatham, Massachusetts (United States).
Station Chatham, located high on a sandy bluff overlooking the open Atlantic, lies adjacent to Monomoy Island national wildlife refuge, a fine destination for anyone in search of wildlife, big surf and good fishing. The station specializes in surf rescues off southern Cape Cod's vast eastern shoals.
Here's an un-subtitled version of the vhf radio call. Be sure to adjust the volume on your computer or in the video's lower right corner:
Listen to other VHF radio calls:
mayday
(grounded vessel's call is picked up by two Coast Guard stations)
scuba mayday
(a fatality; caller's understandable panic garbles communications)
mayday
(sinking vessel gives broad local descriptors of its location)
pan-pan
caller is switched to channel 22a, as protocol, by the Coast Guard)
false distress call
(caller was later arrested, indicted, jailed)
VHF radio's utility in paddllers' rescue by a Coast Guard helicopter
copyright 2008 North American Kayak Fishing
Subscribe to:
Post Comments (Atom)
Posts
2 comments:
From a message board:
Hi Adam. Can't decipher the specifics of the situation, obviously, but sounds like he had run aground at a beach. Would a "pan-pan-pan" distress call have been more appropriate, if indeed the skipper and crew were not at risk of serious injury/loss of life?
I wondered too whether a pan-pan would have been better, but it seems apples and oranges.
Sounds like the skipper simply wanted help pronto, could have cared less whether it was pan-pan or mayday, and just wanted to get down to business.
That's one element nice about unlicensed VHF use in the US (and the bad, too): the Coast Guard doesn't care if you don't use the right terms. They just want names, location, problem so they can start to work the case.
Pan-pan is better meant for all vessels in the area, which assume that the boat on the beach could have been helped by others than just the c.g.
I'm going to be posting more audio clips later, including transcripts and background stories if I can dig them up.
Post a Comment