Other Marine Radio Service in Canada

• Coastal and Inland Waters Marine Telephone Service operates in the 2 MHz and VHF band. It is used by ships.
• High Seas Marine Telephone Service: This service provides communications to ships a great distance from shore and is available only through the Vancouver (VAI) station in Canada. Small craft are making increasing use of this service. WIth careful selection of frequencies, it is possible to communicate over great distances.
• CCG NAVTEX Service: NAVigational TeleX service uses 518 kHz on a time shared basis for the broadcast of weather and navigational information, weather warnings, ice reports, SAR reports, messages and DGPS notices, current changes to navigational aids. It is part of the GMDSS. It is rarely found on pleasure craft. The receivers decode the digital messages and stores them in memory and be read at your convenience (or stored on a connected computer). Service is availabele along coastlines of all countries.
• COSPAS-SARSAT will only monitor EPIRBs and other emergency signals on 406 MHz. (121.5 and 243 MHz emergency beacons will no longer be monitored by satellite after February 2009.) COSPAS-SARSAT is a satellite-based search and rescue system established by the U.S., Russia, Canada, and France to locate emergency radio beacons.
• Pollution messages: All vessels are requested to report oil slicks or pollution of any kind to the nearest MCTS (Marine Communications & Traffic Services) Centre.
• Satellite phones will become a reality by fall 1998. You will no longer have to deal with any other country's telephone system when you travel around the world! Motorola has invested $6 billion in its Iridium project, which uses 66 earth-orbiting satellites. Star-gazers will notice brilliant Iridium flashes as they pass overhead from sunlight reflecting off their antennas. They can become brighter than Venus for a few seconds. Precitions are available at www.gsoc.dlr.de/.satvis/.
• RadioMedical Marine Telephone Service: Master of ships may obtain medical advice by call an MCTS Centre and request to be connected to a doctor. The cost of this service is absorbed by the MCTS centre (Marine Communication and Traffic Services).
• After March 1999, Morse Code will be no longer monitored by the Canadian Coast Guard since it has been largely replaced by GMDSS.

  THE MORSE CODE
  You can rearrange the letters to get:
  HERE COME DOTS

• 2 companies offer digitally encoded audio, music (no commercials) that will work up to 200 miles offshore (U.S.). Receiver, antenna and monthly subscription fee are required.
• Vancouver Island Trunk System - network of open Amateur radio repeaters for radio communications in southern B.C..

To apologize for the lack of "ham" radio information I will add my favourite "boat-anchor" cartoon from Andrew M Cohn (andy@gldl.net) whose great cartoons can be found at www.qsl.net/k4adl.