Many Marine (VHF/SSB) Radio services are now provided
through 'remote' systems - controlled from a central site - and others
are increasingly offering an 'automatic', or a 'semi-automatic' service
using 'Autolink', DSC, or some other method of 'setting-up' the call
without the need for an operator on-shore to connect you to the required
number. Most Coast Radio Stations providing a PC service can connect
you to almost any other country in the world.
Marine VHF and SSB radio 'PC' services.
ALRS Volume I lists Coast Radio Stations (CRS) providing a Public
Correspondence (PC) service for Marine VHF and for Marine MF IHF
SSB Radio. Services provided are mainly Radio Telephone (VHF, MF
and HF services) and Radio Telex (including e-mail) - primarily on MF
and HF (for use with your Marine SSB Radio).
If you know the name of the Coast Radio Station you wish to
contact (using your Marine VHF ISSB Radio), you can go to the index
at the back of ALRS Vol. I - where stations are listed in alphabetical
order with the page number alongside.
If you don't know the name of a station, in the country you wish to
contact, you can start by looking at the 'Index of Geographical Sections'
at the front of Vol. 1. That will point you to the page(s) listing the radio
stations in your destination country.
The current edition of ALRS Vol. I lists countries, and the CRSs
in each country, in geographical order along the coastline of each
continent - not in alphabetical order (though that may change with
subsequent issues of ALRS Vol. I).
Using the current method of station listing; once you find the
nearest station to your location, you can see which stations are coming-
up next as you progress along the coast. Some individual country sections
also have maps showing the location of individual stations, pictorially
(which will be particularly helpful if/when ALRS Vol. I changes from
geographical to alphabetical listing).
The type of information listed for each VHF ISSB CRS, in each
country, may include:
The land-line telephonelfax/telex number(s) for the station.
The Position of the station (latitude & longitude).
- WT services: (morse code services - which would require an operator
capable of sending and receiving messages using morse. WT services
MARINE COMMUNICATIONS 47
