[CW] How message handling was done?

Wed Apr 24 09:09:42 EDT 2019

Unfortunately, "Ships in geographical regions had specific shore
stations that they communicated with." wasn't true as soon as ships
were outfitted with HF equipment.  At the beginning of ship radio,
that was the case because the only frequencies were medium wave - 410
to 512 kc/s band.  At first ships with Dollar Radio only would
communicate with that companies radio stations, or RCA ships with RCA
stations, or ITT/Mackay with ITT/Mackay stations.  This changed by the
1950s.

Sending position reports wasn't required by law, and many stations
just threw them in the trash after receiving them, that was the
standing order by management at Tuckerton Radio, NJ / WSC under the
new owners around 1985 to 1990.  Even AMVER was voluntary, but USMER -
United States MERchant Ship Vessel Locator Reporting System was
mandatory but only for USA ships.  I'm sure that somehow the
information contained in the AMVER and USMER messages got put in some
location file, but it wasn't strictly legal because it was not a
message to the coast station.  Same thing with noon position reports
sent as a MSG to the company or charterers.  TR's were only sent
entering port or leaving port, and mostly leaving port.  I've never
heard or received a TR from a ship in mid voyage either on ship or
while working at a coast station.  That doesn't mean it was never
done, but it was rarely done, I probably did it myself when in the
middle of the Pacific to a far away station I heard, just to give the
equipment a test.  TR ship name coming from departure port bound for
destination port.

The only charterer who mandated a station to use was EXXON which
ordered you to keep a watch on Port Arthur Radio (RCA), WPA.
Unfortunately, if you got out of the area of USA, you could never work
them because they had very poor antennas.  You would barely hear them
in the Gulf of Mexico. Their antenna was about 100 feet long and up
perhaps 15 feet for 418 kHz and 500 kHz.  Their HF antennas were
equally as poor.  So no matter what they said, if you went away from
the USA you couldn't copy them and would have to ask WCC or KPH for
them to get the traffic from WPA (or WOE, Lantana, FL) which they did
for free.

As Jim Kennedy states the ship radio station operating company -
usually ITT/Mackay or RCA, or later Radio-Holland, was required by FCC
Part 80 and ITU treaties to maintain a full set of ITU publications
which contained a list of ship stations and a list of coast stations,
the coast station list book had traffic list times and frequencies.

I have had owners send me a last minute diversion message - say
through a smaller station like Baltimore Radio / WMH and I just on a
lark copied their traffic list, I saw I was on the list - we weren't
bound for Baltmore, but it was a diversion message from New Jersey to
Boston.  We would have arrived at NJ during the night and if I hadn't
gotten the message, their would be a lot of confusion when the Captain
called the pilots to dock in NJ.  Fortunately I got the diversion
message.  It's always good to follow the radio officers headwatch
notice in the noon position report message rather than think the
office secretary knows anything about Baltimore radio (very weak
station) but physically nearer than Mobile, AL Radio / WLO (very
strong station) which was my Headwatch.

But I got the message and the Captain was pleased and I was relieved I
had lucked out and listened to WMH which I only did once a day if
that.  I never got messages via WMH.

73
DR
N1EA

On Wed, Apr 24, 2019 at 8:22 AM Dr Jim Kennedy via CW
<cw at mailman.qth.net> wrote:
>
>
> Ships in geographical regions had specific shore stations that they communicated with.
>
> When a ship left a port it would notify its local shore station of such along with its destination. Along its voyage it would also indicate periodically its position.
>
> As the ship moved across the globe they would change the shore stations that they communicated with. They would then listen at specific times on specific frequencies as prescribed in a shore station document, maintained in the radio shack, supplied by the ship owner's operating company for that station's traffic list or to indicate that they had traffic for that shore station.
>
>
> In addition, other ships in the area might also act as a relay to a ship or shore station when atmospherics caused a lot of QRN.
>
> Hope this helps to answer the questions posted.
>
>
>
> Dr. Jim (Doc) Kennedy
>
> SKCC-NAQCC-FISTS | RACES & ARES
>
>    USGCG Radioman & commercial radiotelegrapher
>
> PG0222156 - T2GB070658
>
> email: K2PHD at arrl.net <mailto:K2PHD at arrl.net>
>
>
>
>
>
> Sent from my iPad
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