ANSWERING THE CALL FOR BETTER COMMUNICATIONS

The U.S. Coast Guard is preparing to improve boating safety by modernizing its short-range communications system to better hear boaters' distress calls. The new system is known as Rescue 21. This article describes how and why Rescue 21 was developed, and the benefits of the new system. Rescue 21 will allow Coast Guard watchstanders to record, play back and index distress calls and view them in a user-friendly digital format. The most obvious improvement of the new system will be filling in coverage gaps in the current VHF-FM system. Rescue 21 will enable the Coast Guard to receive a call from a one-watt radio as far as 20 miles from the territorial sea baseline. The new system will also have increased channel capacity, which allows for simultaneous communications on six channels. Another Rescue 21 improvement is the use of direction-finding technology that will detect a distressed vessel's bearing with a great deal of accuracy. The system will allow asset tracking so that operation centers will know where Coast Guard assets are at any given time. Because the project encompasses over 95,000 miles of coastline, deployment was segmented into manageable areas centered around Coast Guard Groups. The first systems are planned to be in place by September 2003, and deployment should be completed in all regions by the end of September 2006.

• Corporate Authors:

  United States Coast Guard

  National Maritime Center, 4200 Wilson Boulevard
  Arlington, VA  United States  22203-1804
• Authors:
  • Edwards, S
• Conference:
  • Proceedings of the Marine Safety Council
• Publication Date: 2003-7

Language

• English

Media Info

• Features: Figures; Photos;
• Pagination: p. 47-49
• Serial:
  • Volume: 60
  • Issue Number: 3

Subject/Index Terms

• TRT Terms: Boating; Communications; Development; Distress alerting systems; Distress signals; Marine safety; Monitoring; Radio direction finders
• Identifier Terms: Rescue 21 (Communications program); United States Coast Guard
• Subject Areas: Marine Transportation; Operations and Traffic Management;

Filing Info

• Accession Number: 00967958
• Record Type: Publication
• Files: TRIS
• Created Date: Jan 9 2004 12:00AM