Some basic communication tips for people new to VHF marine radio

[penfold]

Peel Ports who operate Mudway VTS no longer have an office at Sheerness its in Liverpool, 269.3 miles away, the river is viewed by a few remote cameras.

Someone told me they've done the same on the Clyde, the tower at Greenock is now unoccupied(at least by anyone with a radio). Peel management are a bunch of parasites, clearly learned nothing from the deaths they were blamed for when the Flying Phantom sank and no doubt will learn nothing from the sinking of Biter.

 

[Bilgediver]

Try and understand the east coast Scottish fisherman speaking the Doric on Ch 10.

 

[ears media]

....... and the most annoying recent thing are the European boats coming over who don't turn off their data bursts that chirp at the end of each transmission.

 

[Sandy]

I've always enjoyed the chatter of the fishing boats from Falmouth to Peterhead even though I rarely understand a word!

Sadly, RT procedures are poorly taught, people are 'mic shy', have little practice of using their VHF radios and might be moving from one style of radio net to leisure marine.

When I was first taught we started a transmission with Hello XXX this is YYY. I moved to another net where callsigns were used at the end of message and affirmative and negative were banned as there might be a misunderstanding when all somebody heard was 'ative'.

Sailing out of a military port, Plymouth, the mix of styles is interesting, 'on my callsign', is frequently used by the military, the fishing fleet tend to have a conversation and drop prowords, the commercial and leisure users have a mix of usage and understanding of how to use their VHF.

When visiting a French Semaphore station a few years ago I asked that if I sent a voice MayDay would they understand, of course sir was their reply, it is a very structured message and we should work out what is happening - if we can't we call Falmouth and play them the tape.

The response from Lowestoft Port Control has been brilliant on both occasions I've visited - always good of them to turn the lights on as you approach the pierheads. I was not so keen at the 3 knots across the entrance! The service from Dover when I visited in August 2021 was outstanding, but the following yacht who snuck in behind a ferry had a verbal broadside!

 

[ears media]

They're really helpful, and not afraid to say when they don't know - but the funniest this week was somebody asking permission to leave the harbour and the response was, "well, if you're sure?" the boat seemed very confused, and they then added - there's about 1.5m of swell just outside the pier heads, so if you fancy it ..." They turned around and went back.

Joking aside, they also have to put up with pedestrian idiots who wait for the bridge to rise, then scale the rising pavement, using the hand rail as a ladder. They even have to cope with people trying to commit suicide - so that involves the bridge staff, lifeboat, coastguard, police and even firefighters - who oddly are the only ones who are allowed to go into water to rescue people. The lifeboat and coastguard staff cannot jump into water to rescue people - firefighters can!

 

[SaltIre]

They're really helpful, and not afraid to say when they don't know - but the funniest this week was somebody asking permission to leave the harbour and the response was, "well, if you're sure?" the boat seemed very confused, and they then added - there's about 1.5m of swell just outside the pier heads, so if you fancy it ..." They turned around and went back.

Is it lawful to publish conversations heard on maritime radio? When I did my VHF/DSC course & exams I was told it wasn't. Am I out of date?

 

[ears media]

No it’s not, but I have always taken it to mean transcripts or recordings. I took care to paraphrase here and with GDPR in mind, nothing enables personal ID. Aircraft band recordings or feeds online get shut down quickly, so That’s the same. I think our system dates back to when the Post Office ran the ship to shore channels. My understanding is the word used is “retransmission” so possibly written transcripts might be different from audio recordings, or live streaming? Interesting.

 

[ears media]

I thought you might like this one! Drove everyone mad, and involved having to do railway bridge swings and road lifts without the benefit of radio comms!

 

[LittleSister]

Lots of the preceding posts complain that people haven't learnt or remembered what they were taught, or that the courses are poor/variable etc. Be that as it may be, but I suspect a lot of boaters (especially somewhere like the Boards) have never done any training.

(Mind you, I've been listening lately to some aviation radio from the USA lately (for reasons I find difficult to explain!), and I am truly shocked about how sloppy the radio communication is there, and that's from airline pilots and Air Traffic Control for huge busy airports, not just private pilots!)

 

[Bouba]

I very rarely post, but I did a video today about how to use your radio mixed in with the professionals, without making yourself sound pretty silly. I did it really because over the past few days I've heard such a large amount of really embarrassing stuff from people who are clearly very uncomfy with comms and how it should work. Most established leisure boaters have no problems with the radio side, but some people just paint a truly awful impression of boat owners and users who really haven't understood what they were taught in the exam class

Excellent stuff !!....one small favor....can you remake it in French...s’il-vous-plaît

 

[Chiara’s slave]

A certain Solent harbour office said ‘over and out’ to me yesterday. My very experienced crew were astonished.

 

[ears media]

I totally agree about US aviation. It breaks all the common sense rules on communications, especially when talk8ng to a person who does not have an English as first language. If you learn ‘proper’ English, some of the abbreviations and mangled grammar clearly confuse, plus the ridiculous speed of the controllers. Military ATC might be faster than UK civil, but always clear and unambiguous. 30 years back I had some experience of Government communications, and it was always precise and unambiguous, that was the key. thank goodness marine is more tolerant.

 

[dunedin]

A certain Solent harbour office said ‘over and out’ to me yesterday. My very experienced crew were astonished.

And a lot of "Rodgering" seems to go on at the MCA Coastguard stations .......

 

[Bilgediver]

I totally agree about US aviation. It breaks all the common sense rules on communications, especially when talk8ng to a person who does not have an English as first language. If you learn ‘proper’ English, some of the abbreviations and mangled grammar clearly confuse, plus the ridiculous speed of the controllers. Military ATC might be faster than UK civil, but always clear and unambiguous. 30 years back I had some experience of Government communications, and it was always precise and unambiguous, that was the key. thank goodness marine is more tolerant.

I do not believe there are any rules at JFK and routines only understood by regulars and heaven help a first time pilot with poor understanding of English

 

[TrondS]

Is it lawful to publish conversations heard on maritime radio? When I did my VHF/DSC course & exams I was told it wasn't. Am I out of date?

It may vary from country to country, but in Norway it is strictly illegal to publish any recordings from maritime VHF communications.

I agree with many comments here about poor radio communication skills. Being used to work in aviation (ATC), I find the lack of proper radio disipline and standards in the maritime world really awful. Even many of the professionals use a "friendly" talk, not even bothering to include callsigns / vessel names. Stay professional, be clear, and don't be afraid to use the radio.
And please do not use ch 16 for chatting about the latest fishing stories...

Once I overheard a conversation between two pleasure boats named "where are we" and "don't know". (My translation of the vessel names). It was insane and hilarious at the same time.

 

[ears media]

Today in the office I heard a small yacht call our local mooring over and over again, getting no reply and Getty more and more frustrated. The radio lives on a scan of local channels - and I realised they were on ch80 - I shouldn't hear them on ch 80 - I should only hear the marina, so their radio was working this semi-duplex channel the wrong way around? I've never heard this happen before?

 

[PaulRainbow]

Today in the office I heard a small yacht call our local mooring over and over again, getting no reply and Getty more and more frustrated. The radio lives on a scan of local channels - and I realised they were on ch80 - I shouldn't hear them on ch 80 - I should only hear the marina, so their radio was working this semi-duplex channel the wrong way around? I've never heard this happen before?

He was using the US channel set.

 

[ears media]

Of course! That hadn't occurred to me. Another thing that perhaps should be in the test! Good idea for a video too!

 

[MrB]

Lots of the preceding posts complain that people haven't learnt or remembered what they were taught, or that the courses are poor/variable etc. Be that as it may be, but I suspect a lot of boaters (especially somewhere like the Boards) have never done any training.

(Mind you, I've been listening lately to some aviation radio from the USA lately (for reasons I find difficult to explain!), and I am truly shocked about how sloppy the radio communication is there, and that's from airline pilots and Air Traffic Control for huge busy airports, not just private pilots!)

I totally agree about US aviation. It breaks all the common sense rules on communications, especially when talk8ng to a person who does not have an English as first language. If you learn ‘proper’ English, some of the abbreviations and mangled grammar clearly confuse, plus the ridiculous speed of the controllers. Military ATC might be faster than UK civil, but always clear and unambiguous. 30 years back I had some experience of Government communications, and it was always precise and unambiguous, that was the key. thank goodness marine is more tolerant.

I'm a pilot and did most of my flight training in Florida and I think the comms works fine. When I got there the radio work was difficult for me as I was trying to use my best English radio telephony and it just didn't work. (They also thought the term "Radio Telephony" was funny) My Instructor took me to the tower to meet all the controllers and it started to make sense after that although they did have it in for the "Brit" by vectoring me everywhere at every opportunity possible and making me "go around" all the time when I was on finals! I won't go into zero comms and light signals from the tower as they just took the pi55 lol. American ATC may sound lax but it isn't at all, it's just not stuffy. It's very structured but friendly, you learn to retrieve and read back instructions very quickly and you have to listen very intently. Also all the abbreviations are mostly known as you have filed a flight plan so you know where you are going and the control centres/ATC know your intentions too so it's a lot of forward planning. Daunting at first but you soon realise they are only there to help you and keep you safe and are extremely helpful and forgiving. If you do mess up though the ATC controller will ask you to call them after the flight and give you the dreaded number while every other pilot on the channel is sniggering. Not fun lol. I was based in Orlando Sanford Int. airport so Orlando int. and Miami int. were nothing new to me. I will say though, when it's not too busy they do like to have "fun" with you.

 

[nicho]

Shouldn’t that be ‘Roger, over and out’?

Roger - “Received Order Generated Expect Response”……..isn’t it?