They’re the stuff of dreams, legend, maritime lore: the Northwest Passage, the Drake Passage, Greenland, South Georgia Island, Cape Horn. Cruising these fabled waters requires a capable and prepared yacht, a seasoned and adventurous crew, the right communications and safety tools, and a pinch of luck. In this sense, the ancient Roman philosopher Seneca was right: Luck is what happens when preparation meets opportunity.

Satellite connectivity isn’t new. The first very-small-aperture terminal (VSAT) satcom systems rolled out in the late 1970s, giving mariners the ability to send and receive information at sea. Contemporary VSAT systems typically operate on the Ka-frequency or Ku-frequency bands to offer high-speed performance and bandwidth.

The problem, however, is that VSAT networks typically concentrate their coverage beams on populated areas and commonly cruised waters. Moreover, these systems utilize high frequencies that often suffer from rain and snow fade when the weather sours.

Iridium’s Certus network doesn’t deliver the kinds of data-transfer speeds that enable video or social media streaming, but it does provide global connectivity that isn’t affected by weather. The largest Certus terminals are built with multi-element patched antennas that can simultaneously listen to—and evaluate the signal strength of—multiple satellites for trustworthy connectivity. Certus terminals also can be paired with a VSAT terminal, and long-range cellular and Wi-Fi antennas, to provide out-of-band management and lowest-cost routing. For adventurous cruisers, Certus’ connectivity improves the farther north (or south) from the equator one cruises.

Iridium began work on its Certus network in 2015. Today, the system is composed of 66 cross-linked low-Earth-orbit (LEO) satellites that circle the globe in near-polar orbits that are each roughly perpendicular to the equator. (Imagine the segments of a peeled orange coming together at either end.) At any given time, there are more LEO satellites concentrated at the north and south poles than at the equator. And Iridium’s LEO satellites operate on the L band (1 to 2 GHz), which is a much lower frequency than the Ka and Ku bands, and which isn’t frazzled by rain or snow.

As with all forms of satcom, orbiting Certus-enabled LEO satellites communicate with an onboard terminal. That terminal, in turn, is networked to a wireless router that makes the satcom signal available for all connected devices. While Iridium builds and maintains its LEO constellation, it partners with third-party hardware manufacturers—including Cobham, Intellian, Lars-Thrane and Thales—that build consumer-ready terminals.

While Iridium allows five terminals of different sizes to operate on its Certus network, 700-level terminals—with data-transfer uplink speeds of up to 352 kilobits per second and downlink speeds of up to 704 Kbps—offer Certus’ highest throughput speeds.

For example, Intellian’s C700 terminal is a solid-state device that uses a 12-element patch antenna. “It is then able to track multiple satellites and always select the strongest signal,” says Paul Comyns, Intellian’s senior director channel sales Americas. This setup, he adds, “avoids any issue of blockage, whether that be from onboard obstructions like a sail or mast, or if you happen to be cruising in a fjord where there are big mountains and trees.” Given that the C700 has a 12-element patch antenna, some are still likely seeing satellites even if others are blocked.

The 700-level terminals are monogamous, which means they only transmit and receive data to and from a single satellite at once. However, they’re opportunistic in that they’re often simultaneously auditioning two to four other satellites.

“Because each patch antenna is pointing in a different direction, it has the opportunity to pick up a signal from a different satellite,” Comyns says. “It’s always listening to different satellites and then picking which is the strongest signal and utilizing that one.”

During a 10-minute voice call, a 700-series terminal might change satellites several times. These transitions are nearly seamless to the end user, and the multiple data pathways mean that 700-level terminals on Iridium’s Certus network offer some of the highest reliability levels of any satcom solution.

Certus terminals also can be paired with VSAT systems to deliver an out-of-band management solution for the yacht’s primary satcom system. Additionally, third-party long-range cellular and Wi-Fi antennas can be added for lowest-cost data routing.

This ability to play nicely with others, coupled with Certus’ reliability and global coverage, makes these terminals ideal companions for high-latitude cruisers or for those transiting the South Pacific, where it might otherwise be impossible to download email, GRIB weather files and chart updates, or to transmit and receive emergency communications.

“If you want a reliable connection that’s going to get through whatever the weather, then Certus is a perfect solution,” Comyns says.

As with all technology, Certus service has its pros and cons. As mentioned, speeds aren’t fast enough to stream video or upload it to social media, and Certus is not the least-expensive form of satellite communications (see Iridium’s website for airtime costs). That said, the system is global, there are no moving internal components, and the equipment is relatively small and easy to fit aboard. Factor in Certus’ ability to provide out-of-band management and lowest-cost data routing, and the network presents itself as an intriguing communications solution for anyone who is interested in plying the dark spots on most VSAT coverage maps.

One doesn’t need to be an ancient philosopher to see how adding a Certus system might generate its own kind of luck.

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Many aspects of life changed in 2020, and one trend that accelerated rapidly is working remotely. For yacht owners and charterers, remote work can mean working from on board while casting off the dock lines. This alluring option provides prized social distancing and family time, but it also hinges on fast, seamless connectivity at sea.

While personal computers, printers and smart devices are all part of the floating-office ecosystem, the more important prerequisites for creating a robust onboard office are satcom systems. These systems rely on two ingredients: equipment that is mounted (such as an antenna) and housed belowdecks and the network of satellites this equipment uses to send and receive data. Owners can invest in an open system, buying equipment from one vendor and airtime service from a third-party provider, or can install an end-to-end system, with equipment and airtime from the same company.

Both options have merits. Open systems let yachtsmen hand-pick airtime providers when cruising to areas where one might deliver better coverage than another, while end-to-end systems offer seamlessness and a single contact if issues arise. There are numerous hardware players afield, especially in the open-system market. Intellian is a leading manufacturer of network-agnostic equipment, while KVH is a leading end-to-end manufacturer with a proprietary satcom network.

“It’s all about data throughput,” says Paul Comyns, Intellian’s vice president of global marketing, pointing to the company’s V65 and V100NX as options for floating-office antennas. “Uplink and downlink speeds are determined by the airtime provider and how much the customer wants to pay. If you just want to send email or make voice calls, slower-speed connectivity works. But if you want to take Zoom meetings, make video calls, or attend or host webinars, this requires greater bandwidth.”

Generally speaking, an airtime plan that delivers minimum speeds of 2 megabits per second for both uplink and downlink data is enough to support email, enterprise-level software such as Salesforce, and videoconferencing. As a reference, Apple’s FaceTime and Skype both require speeds of 1 to 4 Mbps.

Andrew Bush, KVH’s superyacht group sales director for Europe, the Middle East, Africa and Asia-Pacific, says another way to think about speeds is that if a boater is just sending and receiving email, he can use the same internet connections from five or six years ago. Sending and receiving large attachments or videos, and participating in videoconferencing, requires faster connections.

Bush points to KVH’s TracPhone V7-HTS, which delivers speeds up to 10/3 Mbps (downlink and uplink), or the TracPhone V11-HTS, which delivers speeds up to 20/3 Mbps, on KVH’s mini-VSAT Broadband network. With video calls and videoconferencing, Bush says, “You can get away with a slow connection, but it’s not quality. It gets compressed. It’s the difference between standard TV and high-definition.”

Comyns says two kinds of open-system airtime contracts are available. With unmetered plans, owners pay for a committed information rate and can stream unlimited amounts of data; the only limiting factor is the size of the CIR data pipeline. With metered plans, owners buy monthly (or weekly, for charterers) data allotments and then purchase additional megabytes of data once the allotted pool is depleted, similar to early cellphone plans.

Overall, if an owner or charterer needs high-quality videoconferencing and the ability to access enterprise software, Comyns says, they “want a CIR. There are no data overages, and they get unlimited access, just like at home.”

Alternatively, KVH’s V7-HTS and V11-HTS systems provide dual channels: a high-speed metered connection and a slower but unlimited-use channel. Here, Bush says, owners or charterers can reserve the fast-connection channel for their business needs, while reserving the unlimited channel for family and crew use. This latter point is especially important when wireless devices are involved. Smartphones, Bush says, use a lot of background data.

KVH’s mini-VSAT Manager can also help to manage data use. “Owners and captains can see what data is being used, and they can restrict certain types of data so the crew isn’t using all the bandwidth,” says Steve Gorman, KVH’s superyacht group field engineer. Additionally, KVH’s in-house team monitors data use and can recommend different plans if they notice significant data-use spikes.

Cost is an obvious consideration for any satcom customer, but Comyns says there are occasional disconnects between the equipment’s purchase price and its long-term airtime costs.

“A 1-meter antenna is the optimum size,” Comyns says, because “the cost of bandwidth is less for the same speed compared with a 60- or 70-centimeter antenna.” It’s more expensive for airtime providers to send signals to smaller antennas; Comyns and Gorman say owners are wise to select the largest antenna their yacht can accommodate.

Geography is the last major consideration. Years ago, as vessels traveled globally, crewmembers had to swap out each antenna’s radio-frequency component module so the system could employ regional signals. Those days, fortunately, are astern.

“One antenna will work around the world without any change,” Comyns says, adding that satcom systems are GPS-enabled and know which satellites to track. Gorman agrees: “You can cruise around the world, and it’s all done for you.”

Latitude, however, remains a hurdle. Because satellite communications are line of sight, and because geostationary satellites are situated above the equator, yachts cruising to high-latitude zones need to point their antennas toward the far southern horizon. Fortunately, Comyns says, most airtime providers give multiple satellite options. He cites the example of a yacht berthed in Juneau, Alaska: “If a cruise ship arrives, it could block your signal.” The solution is to switch satellites or, as a last resort, reposition the yacht.

Blockage can also occur much closer to the equator. For example, sky-scratching hotels, cruise ships or even a yacht’s own superstructure can block signals. Because of this problem, many yachts have dual satellite-communications antennas. If one gets blocked, the other remains online.

Overall, to equip a yacht as a floating office, consider buying the biggest antenna that fits, and tether it to an airtime plan with ample data. Or while chartering, insist on a properly equipped yacht. The turnkey costs aren’t trivial, but the ability to work from the boat is priceless.

The post The Onboard Office appeared first on Yachting.

The RMS Titanic sailed into infamy when the ship fatally collided with an iceberg on April 14, 1912, taking the lives of more than 1,500 passengers and crew. Generations of naval architects and engineers studied and learned from this tragedy, as did the U.S. Congress, which passed legislation requiring U.S.-flagged ships to carry radiotelegraph equipment for sending and receiving Morse code distress signals. This requirement set the foundation for what became the International Maritime Organization’s Global Maritime Distress and Safety System in 1979.

And yet, while GMDSS has helped to save countless lives since its inception, the equipment it required was bulky and expensive, pushing it out of practical reach for most yachtsmen.

GMDSS has used satellite- and Earth-based radio signals since the late 1980s to facilitate communications between stricken mariners and a Rescue Coordination Center. GMDSS terminals have been permanently fitted to vessels—unlike, say, EPIRBs, which are portable.

That’s all about to change. Historically, Inmarsat has been the only IMO-recognized GMDSS-network satellite ­service provider, but recently, Iridium was ­recognized too. This means competition that is already spurring GMDSS innovations on both the hardware and network fronts.

Innovations we’ve seen so far include nonemergency airtime rates from Iridium and hardware ­advances such as Lars Thrane’s LT-3100S terminal—the first that is designed to ­operate on Iridium’s GMDSS network and delivers GMDSS emergency- and nonemergency-communications ­capabilities in a package that can complement many yachts.

Iridium’s Next network of 66 cross-linked, low-Earth-orbit satellites operates on the L band and provides global communications using Iridium’s Short Burst Data messaging service that transmits small, low-bandwidth data packets. For mariners, this means ­universal access to SMS, email, GRIB weather files, official maritime-safety information, and emergency and nonemergency voice calls.

It’s all delivered via Iridium’s circuit-switched data capability, which doesn’t have VSAT-level speeds. But that doesn’t really matter because there’s no downloads of high-resolution images, video or vector-cartography ­involved. However, unlike VSAT, GMDSS prioritizes emergency communications over nonemergency conversations and data—and VSAT can’t be used for GMDSS communications. GMDSS emergency services and communications (including maritime-safety information) are free of charge, while nonemergency ­communications require an airtime subscription; GMDSS services will still work even if a subscription has expired.

Hardwarewise, Lars Thrane’s LT-3100S consists of a handset, a soda-can-size antenna, and a Bluetooth-enabled control head with an embedded GPS/GNSS receiver. The LT-3100S is the first GMDSS terminal to offer full GMDSS capabilities plus built-in voice. Should calamity strike, users press the terminal’s red emergency button. The system pings the closest Rescue Coordination Center with an electronic satellite distress signal—­including vessel name and navigational details—before automatically placing an emergency voice call to the center, which notifies the proper rescuing authorities and all nearby GMDSS-equipped vessels.

“It’s a huge advantage to have emergency voice, as you can give the [rescue center] your full details,” says Peter Thrane, Lars Thrane’s CEO, adding that the LT-3100S terminal can send and receive data at 2.4 Kbps; with back-end compression, the rate can increase to 10 Kbps.

As Wouter Deknopper, Iridium’s vice president and general manager of maritime, says: “You can make [nonemergency] calls at affordable prices, and it’s good enough for downloading email and GRIB files, but I wouldn’t surf the internet at these speeds.”

For boaters ­interested in downloading GRIB files or sending and receiving data, the LT-3100S transmits and receives files as small packets of data, not large files. Should the connection get disturbed midtransmission, the system resumes where it was interrupted. This process reduces airtime costs and allows users to upload or download (relatively) large files over a low-bandwidth system—sans fear of the system’s priority-and-preemption scheme inconveniently resetting the clock.

This same data-transfer scheme makes nonemergency GMDSS communications an interesting proposition for automated cloud reporting. “We can, and do, a lot with maritime [internet of things] solutions, such as onboard alarms and vessel tracking,” Deknopper says.

Pricing wasn’t available at press time, but Iridium says the LT-3100S—which should begin shipping in early 2020—will represent ­considerable savings over comparable systems. Deknopper stresses that Iridium plans to offer competitive prices for nonemergency GMDSS communications, as well as other enticements. These include contract-winterization options and access to Iridium’s network of partners, which can provide itinerary-specific ­information.

“If you’re navigating through an [­ice-strewn] area, you can get [navigational] information from our Russian partners,” Deknopper says, adding—for anyone transiting the Horn of Africa—that the LT-3100S supports anti-piracy communications.

And, thanks to the control head’s Bluetooth capabilities, users can tether their smartphones to the LT-3100S and use their familiar device for nonemergency GMDSS communications.

The LT-3100S’s small form factor, its ability to provide fully global GMDSS communications, weather and navigational updates, and its purported affordability make it a serious consideration for any bluewater cruiser, offshore angler or high-latitude adventurer. And, should things turn south someplace far north (or south), deliverance will be a matter of talking with a rescue center or fellow mariner, not rearranging the deck chairs on your own private Titanic.

The post Global Safety Net appeared first on Yachting.

Iridium Communications has signed a public services agreement with the International Mobile Satellite Organization, moving Iridium a step closer toward receiving an IMSO letter of compliance that will let the company start providing GMDSS service.

GMDSS is a safety-of-life system that the the International Maritime Organization designed to rescue mariners at sea. Satellite communications systems feed distress information into a network of rescue coordination centers around the world that orchestrate search and rescue efforts.

For decades, according to Iridium, only one company was allowed to provide GMDSS service, limiting coverage reach and capability.

“With Iridium, mariners will for the first time in history have a choice in equipment and service provider while also now reaching 100 percent of the world’s oceans, helping protect mariners no matter where they sail,” the company stated in a press release.

Iridium is reportedly on target to finish development of its GMDSS system by the end of this year. Its first terminal could be installed on any non-SOLAS yacht as soon as it’s approved.

What about owners of SOLAS-class yachts? They are expected to have the new option with Iridium by 2020.

For more information, visit: iridium.com

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