Ais puzzlement

Anyone ever seen an AIS transceiver registered to a specific state?

Especially on a Federal Govt. vessel? Saw this in Tracy Arm in June.

That's the ship's destination. This is a requirement for commercial and maybe government vessels. Basically it helps other vessels to understand where the ship is heading. When traveling the ICW, it gives other boats an idea of which channel an approaching b pi at will be taking. Unfortunately, many vessels are lax about updating their AIS destination.

Ted

<<destination>>

Sorry if I wasn't clear. I know his destination is Tracy Arm; after all, that's where we met.

The point I'm trying to make is that his "flag" of registration is Alaska.

Ah...just looked at the illustration. Its only coincidental that the mouse pointer is parked by the destination. Look at the "flag."

AlaskaProf said:

<<destination>>

Sorry if I wasn't clear. I know his destination is Tracy Arm; after all, that's where we met.

The point I'm trying to make is that his "flag" of registration is Alaska.

Ah...just looked at the illustration. Its only coincidental that the mouse pointer is parked by the destination. Look at the "flag."

Click to expand...

User input-table information I presume

That is what they typed in the field when programming

You can see Russia from there.

Its decoded from the MMSI....

We are just getting set to install an AIS transceiver (in the box in the v-berth, waiting for other projects) and I got interested in how my flag will be displayed (if at all) with my Class B....Here is what I found digging on the internet...

The Flag is decoded from the first three numbers of your MMSI. Those characters are called the Maritime Identification Digits. The first digit is the geographic region of the world (North America=3, Australia is listed under Oceania=5.) The second and third digits are country specific. What I've read is that when 80% of the numbers in a MID are used, a new one will be issued to the country. The USA has 8 in the North America Region, two in territories in the Oceania region:

303 (United State of America - State of Alaska)
338 (United States of America)
358 (United States of America - Puerto Rico)
366, 367, 368, 369 (United States of America)
379 (United States of America - US Virgin Islands)
536 (United States of America - Northern Mariana Islands)
559 (United States of America - American Samoa)

I'm guessing most of the continental US members on here have an MMSI that starts with 338, 366,367,368,369. No explanation why Alaska has its own, other than some of the off the continental territories do, too....

Here are my sources if you want to dig more....

USCG site explaining MMSI codes...
https://www.navcen.uscg.gov/?pageName=mtmmsi


ITU website listing all MID codes (ITU assigns them...)
https://www.itu.int/en/ITU-R/terrestrial/fmd/Pages/mid.aspx

So when I purchase a boat with a radio and an MMSI number, do I inherit the number?

Easting said:

So when I purchase a boat with a radio and an MMSI number, do I inherit the number?

Click to expand...

Found my answer.

I’m looking for a fun place to move to in a few years and that sounds like my kind of town. Unless you are talking about Salt Lake City, in which case I’ve already checked it out.

Woodland Hills said:

Can you let me know where that is? I’m looking for a fun place to move to in a few years and that sounds like my kind of town. Unless you are talking about Salt Lake City, in which case I’ve already checked it out.

Click to expand...

On a more serious note, phreak pretty well nails it for MMSI which also lists next of kin contact information.

<<The USA has 5 in the North America Region, two in territories in the Oceania region: 303 (United State of America - State of Alaska)>>

Great research. That pretty well explains the "how", but the "why" remains a mystery, especially if you know:

The vessel is homeported in Newport, Oregon

Her sistership, Fairweather has a 369 MMSI prefix.

AlaskaProf said:

Great research. That pretty well explains the "how", but the "why" remains a mystery, especially if you know:

The vessel is homeported in Newport, Oregon

Her sistership, Fairweather has a 369 MMSI prefix.

Click to expand...

Thanks. For some reason I thought it was based in Seattle. I want to say it was at Sandpoint when I was in a NOAA dive school in 2008ish and thought it was over visiting from Lake Union at the time. I'll have to look through my notes from that school tomorrow.

They have a facebook page - search @NOAAShipRainier. Whoever maintains it seems to understand ship stuff, so I asked. We'll see what they say!!!

BTW, they were in Tracy Arm surveying it. They have a time lapse video and a cool color hydrograph video on the FB....see their posts from Aug 21 and June 21.

The establishment of the Newport base is a recent thing. The previous station at Sandpoint was literally a poor fit, as they've run aground in the Montlake Cut at least once.

They still have a large lab and admin presence at Sandpoint. My wife had office space there for a couple years when she was working the Exxon Valdez case.