This is a common question we get, “How do you communicate with the people who care when you are so far from land”. On Annecam we have several systems that all work and are tested on or near the first of each month plus they are tested before each blue water passage. Our primary communication system our VHF radio, is for short range communications, ship to ship and ship to shore, we use channel 16 as the calling channel and switch to a working channel once we have established contact. This system is great when sailing in range of a buddy boat and sometimes we can contact a commercial ship if they are passing too close. Our VHF radio is equipped with DSC (Digital Selective Calling) where once we have established the MMSI (Maratime Mobile Service Identity) a 9 digit number allocated to a vessel used for identification. We call the other vessel using this MMSI this calls them direct and almost every time they acknowledge and we establish who is going to give way to who, we have had some great conversations with other ships while on passage. Our VHF is just one way we can communicate.
Our second system is our Iridium Go Satellite WIFI router, this is another way we can communicate while on passage. We can have up to five devises logged into our Iridium Go at the same time, we can make phone calls and SMS messages from anywhere. The biggest bonus with this system is we can download real time weather information for routing while on passage and knowing what is coming regarding the weather is the best safety feature we have. The Iridium Go will do a lot more than what we use it for but we are happy with what we do.
Our third system on board Annecam is our YBTracker, I have set our tracker to up load our position including our COG (Course Over Ground) our SOG (Speed Over Ground) and the air temperature where we are at the time. We can also do direct posts to my facebook page from anywhere in the world via the YBTracker. Our YBTracker is embedded into the footer on this blog page, so any time that you want to see where we are just scroll down to the bottom of this blog page to see.
The photo is Annecam anchored in Blackwattle Bay, framed by eucalypt trees looking down Cook Street
In life not everything you try can be done but nothing can be done if you do not try.