Pocket Mariner live AIS Coverage

Our ship tracking network uses a global network of shore and ship-based radio stations, which receive signals from the AIS system that ships use to broadcast their positions as they travel. Our receiver stations share the ship positions with our cloud-based data server, which pushes them onwards and out to our apps and web services.

We are continuously working on increasing the coverage of our real-time AIS receiver station network. During the last three months we have added more than 100 new AIS stations across 5 continents bringing our live ship coverage to over 80,000 ships. We have supplied the AIS receiver for free for many of these sites. New volunteers are always welcome to join our AIS Network.

Here is a list of the most recent stations we have set up and a snapshot of our global coverage Q1 2022

America

Hudson Bay, NJ

Sakonnet River in Rhode Island

St Lawrence Seaway

British Columbia

Miami, Florida, US (2 new stations)

Antioch, CA.

Stockton,CA

St Bartholomew (Caribbean)

Dominian Republic.

Buenaventura, Colombia.

Lake Erie

Several stations in Uruguay

Several stations in Mexico

Europe

The whole of Norway

The whole of Denmark

The whole of Finland

Scicily, Italy

Turku, Finland

Maasbracht, Netherlands

Ijsselmeer, Nethrlands

Ust-Luga, Russia

St Petersburgh, Russia

Edinburgh, Scotland

Over 30 new stations in and around Sweden.

Eastbourne, UK

Scilly Isles, UK

Isle of Man, UK

Lowestoft, UK

Alicante, SP

Faro, Portugal

Africa

Port Harcourt, Nigeria.

Canary Islands

Dakar, Senegal

Middle East

Kuwait

Dubai

Australasia

Perth, Adelaide, Darwin, Australia

Nagoya, Osaka, Inland Seas, Japan

Singapore

Indonesia

Ho Chi Min City, Vitenam

Sihanoukville, Cambodia.

If you are interested in adding coverage for your area, please read our Cover Your Area information – we can often provide the equipment free of charge.

Charter a yacht with Click&Boat – the Airbnb for boats

When I am travelling for business to places near the sea I always want to be able to charter a yacht to stay on instead of having to search for a hotel – I just prefer the peace that this offers. I was actually able to manage it once while visiting Barcelona for a very large conference. You’d typically think that this would be just as, or if not more expensive but I was able to save a fortune compared to the cost of the regular hotels in the city. On top of this I had a fantastic sea view. Truthfully, at the time it was quite difficult for me to find and arrange. Although not any longer. I have discovered this great new website for yacht charter , Click&Boat.

The company is the boating equivalent of Airbnb. Boat owners create listing for their boats depending on their availability, they choose the price, dates and can offer charters with or without a skipper. Users simply enter in your search requirements, browse the range of boats available and take their pick. Once they have requested the boat they would like they are able to talk directly to the boat owner to make the final arrangements.

So in my case; I needed to stay in Southampton for a Boat Show. The exhibition hotel was over £300 a night and fully booked so instead I found a yacht to charter on Click&Boat within walking distance of the show and for less than half of that price.

I am also thinking of putting my catamaran Sarita on the Click&Boat website – fancy a stay on the beautiful river Wye with power and water to hand?

Click&Boat have more than 20,000 yachts listed on their websites and over 40,000 customer reviews. They are the European authority on peer to peer yacht charter and offer you a secure service.

Go take a look.

Augmented Reality with FLIRONE

Augmented Reality with FLIR ONE

Pocket Mariner collaborated with Practical Boat Owner to successfully complete a demanding night time sea trial of our popular marine navigation apps, SeaNav HD and Boat Beacon with the FLIR ONE Thermal Imager for iOS; a new, low cost , infra-red thermal imaging camera for the iPhone. The FLIR ONE makes thermal imaging affordable and accessible to a much wider audience at a fraction of the cost of the higher end marine IR imaging devices. Pocket Mariner have ingeniously integrated the live thermal image with their widely acclaimed iOS Augmented Reality mode providing identification, distance and bearing of the ships and Aids To Navigation in view at night and in fog. We wanted to see how well and how far off we could spot ships via their infra-red signature and if the FLIR ONE could help with searching for a Man Overboard (MOB).

Practical Boat Owner, the UK’s leading boating magazine, bravely deployed their editors, David Pugh and Ben Meakin, together with Ben’s Impala 28 yacht , “Polly” and intrepid “Woman Overboard” volunteer, Laura, along with Pocket Mariner’s CEO, Steve, on a pitch black night in Southampton water.

Here’s what we saw.

Continue reading “Augmented Reality with FLIRONE”

Marine Navigation with FLIRONE Augmented Reality

Augmented Reality with FLIR ONE

Pocket Mariner collaborated with Practical Boat Owner to successfully complete a demanding night time sea trial of our popular marine navigation apps, SeaNav HD and Boat Beacon with the FLIR ONE Thermal Camera; a new, low cost , infra-red thermal imaging camera for the iPhone. The FLIR ONE makes thermal imaging affordable and accessible to a much wider audience at a fraction of the cost of the higher end marine IR imaging devices. Pocket Mariner have ingeniously integrated the live thermal image with their widely acclaimed iOS Augmented Reality mode providing identification, distance and bearing of the ships and Aids To Navigation in view at night and in fog. We wanted to see how well and how far off we could spot ships via their infra-red signature and if the FLIR ONE could help with searching for a Man Overboard (MOB).

Here’s what we saw.

Continue reading “Marine Navigation with FLIRONE Augmented Reality”

SailTimer Wind Instrument, SeaNav and Pebble SmartWatch

Some of SailTimer’s customers asked them if their bluetooth WindInstrument would work with Pocket Mariner’s SeaNav Marine Navigation app and if the wind information could also be displayed on our free SeaNav Pebble watch companion app. So SailTimer asked us and now it does…

The SailTimer WindInstrument is completely wireless, no power of data lines, so the install is far simpler than for other marine wind vanes. It is the first masthead anemometer with a digital compass built into the wind direction arrow so you get true wind direction even when docked or at anchor. It sends the wind data via bluetooth and is solar powered with 24 hour running. The WindInstrument if fully weather and waterproof (submersible) and has innovative wind cup blades design to maintain equal accuracy when sailing heeled over.

Continue reading “SailTimer Wind Instrument, SeaNav and Pebble SmartWatch”

ShipPlotter AIS sharing to Boat Beacon and Pocket Mariner

Its very easy to set up using the UDP/IP peer to peer sharing feature in ShipPlotter’s I/O settings. See screenshots below. Select enable in the UDP/IP peer-to-peer output, enter the IP address 54.204.25.151 and Remote Port number 5322 (see area circled in red).

Click OK when finished. You will return to the main program window. Click on the “Start” button and you should then see your data on this web page:-

http://boatbeaconapp.com/station/5322

N.B. If you would like your own dedicated UDP port number and web view to share to please email us at support@pocketmariner.com

Boat Beacon now has all NOAA US RNC (Raster) Marine Charts available

Pocket Mariner were invited to help NOAA with their new raster charts service. We met up with them in the US last year and have been working with them on the trial. NOAA’s Raster Navigational Charts (RNCs) are produced by NOAA’s Office of Coast Survey (OCS) and are designed for marine navigation, but can also be used as a marine base map by GIS users, coastal and ocean planning staff, and the general public. NOAA raster navigational charts (NOAA RNC®) are full-color digital images of NOAA paper charts. They provide a consistent view of the marine environment, but with more than 2,100 individual chart and inset files available, finding the right chart at the right scale can be time consuming.

The trial aimed to create a map service of all 2,100+ raster navigational charts and their insets. The charts display as a seamless mosaic with the map collar or neat line—the information around the chart providing scale and notes—removed. Also, the map service displays only those charts appropriate for the viewing scale and map extent requested (from 1:5 million to 1:1,000 scale!). The seamless NOAA RNCs within the service are updated monthly and represent the most recent version of the RNCs and their respective Notice to Mariners at the time of the update.

The trial has been a great success and we are now busy rolling out the new service to use in our Boat Beacon, SeaNav and Boat Watch apps via a simple In App Purchase. This gives our customers access to all 2,100 charts including all updates. The charts for a region automatically download when you view an area and we cache them locally on your device so that they display instantly the next time you look at the map and will also display when you are not connected to the internet. This also means customers using Boat Beacon as a display for external AIS receivers like Digital Yachts or the new and very competitively priced dAISy one ($59 – $41) can use Boat Beacon on their boat without needing an internet connection.

Boat Beacon on iOS is first out of the block with support for US NOAA raster charts. You can get it here :-

https://itunes.apple.com/app/boat-beacon-ais-marine-navigation/id494877039

Boat Watch iOS is next and we hope to have Boat Beacon on Android with US raster charts ready shortly following that. We can also add seamless raster chart options for the UK, Ireland, France, Netherlands and Germany – please let us know if you would be interested so we can raise the priority to get the work done – email us at support@pocketmariner.com or answer our quick 3 question survey here

https://www.surveymonkey.co.uk/r/8CFCWD2

If you want to check out what the charts look like for your area before getting them in our apps you can use the Raster Navigational Charts Google Earth Tool. This is a Google Earth file of all the charts and insets available and is updated monthly along with the map service updates. Clicking on a chart outline gives you information about that chart, such as title, scale, and date updated. Plus, you have the option to overlay in Google Earth a collared or a collarless version of the chart by clicking on the respective preview link.http://nosimagery.noaa.gov/rnc/NOAA_RNCs.kmz

Here are some screen shots from Boat Beacon on an iPad with the US NOAA raster charts around Miami:-

Pleasure Craft Azura selected (note the track in red and our unique trip detail feature which includes departure point as well as the standard destination info – Fort Lauderdale to Key West).

In this screenshot we have tapped on the mid channel Safe Water mark Aid to Navigation (AIS AtoN) on the approach to Miami (MIAMI LB M). All AtoN’s which have AIS available are selectable on the charts and will show distance and bearing from your location.

You can instantly toggle the charts on and off:-

National Coastwatch Barry now provides live AIS service for Mariners

Pocket Mariner and Digital Yacht have sponsored a new AIS receiver for the National CoastWatch Institute ( NCI ) station in Barry. Terry Ewington, the station manager, and his team helped us with the installation today and we now have a live AIS internet feed providing greatly improved real time coverage for the Bristol Channel from Bristol City centre across to Newport and down through Cardiff and Barry to Ilfracombe on the north Devon coast. The real time AIS data is available instantly for folks using our Boat Beacon, SeaNav and free Boat Watch apps.

The NCI perform an increasingly important “eyes on the ground” role for marine safety, especially with the loss of many of our regional Coastguard stations due to centralisation by the MCA in the UK. The NCI have also recently been assigned VHF channel 65 as a dedicated VHF channel to provide information and assistance on. Call them up on channel 65 if you are passing in the Bristol Channel or phone them on 01446 420746.

The Barry NCI station is in a wonderful and beautiful location at Nells Point with excellent views and a coastal path running past it. It is very well worth a visit if you are in the area or call them up on VHF Channel 65 if you are sailing in the area and need local information or help. You can check out the live data using this web link or on any of our apps.

http://boatbeaconapp.com/station/7039

New NAVTEX App for iPhone and iPad

One of our AIS contributors, Duarte in Portugal, has recently written an interesting and unique marine navigation app that we thought we should let our readers know about. It allows you to view Navtex information directly on your iPhone or iPad without needing an HF radio on board. NAVTEX provides navigational and meteorological warnings and forecasts, as well as urgent maritime safety information to ships. You can download Navtex for free from the App Store here:- https://itunes.apple.com/us/app/navtex/id1065285995 . You can also try out all the features for free for a week.

There is a short video clip showing what the app can do here:-

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wx-um26WoDE&authuser=0

and here is what Duarte has to say about his app:-

Navtex should be a requirement to any mariner, hobbyist or professional, regardless the type and size of vessel as it offers important Navigation Warnings that are safety-related while at sea.
Nearly 200 NAVTEX Radio Stations across the world form a global coverage network transmitting messages either in 490kHz, 518kHz, 4209.5kHz, 424kHz and 486kHz.

At sea, safety is everything so our Navtex App will fetch the latest NAVTEX messages issued by the several official entities and present them to you whenever you want.
You don’t need to connect your iPhone/iPad to any HF Radio. Only an internet connection is required. Synchronize and within seconds you have the worldwide updated Navtex information in your pocket.
You may select any of the available NAVTEX stations in the App and check their transmission schedule, frequencies, local data and latest important transmitted messages.

The Navtex Navigational Warnings will be collected from the internet and will be stored on your device, so you can read them even if you are off-line.

In Brazil, Australia and New Zeeland Navigation Warnings are not broadcasted via NAVTEX. However, this App will still fetch the latest Navigation Warnings from those regions and show them to you.

Additionally, you can also subscribe to APRS weather that is broadcasted by ham radio enthusiasts all over the world. It is a good backup system to gather weather information in case of failure of the vessels’s primary systems.

ActiveCaptain with SeaNav and BoatWatch

The latest versions of our SeaNav and BoatWatch iOS apps now include the fabulous ActiveCaptain database providing on and off-line access to information on tens of thousands of marinas, anchorages, hazards and local knowledge (bridges, locks etc.) , as well as reviews from other boaters, shown geographically on marine charts, satellite images, or street maps. The ActiveCaptain coverage is global. There is information on Marinas and Harbour side restaurants etc. from around the world including the US, Canada, UK, France, Spain etc. . If you aren’t already signed up for ActiveCaptain you can do it for free in a few seconds here:-

https://activecaptain.com/register.php

We found Jeff at ActiveCaptain really supportive and helpful on the integration with his data and had some lovely comments back from him on how well we did it too “The Pocket Mariner developers have been exceptional to work with. They are real boaters who get out on the water with their own tools.” Jeffrey Siegel, ActiveCaptain.

We look forward to adding more features and the ability to post reviews from our apps too in the near future.