Torm Shipping chooses VSAT for entire fleet - Digital Ship

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SATCOMS of February, as we transfer traffic off I-4 F1, and this gets to its final location just before the 24th of February," said Mr Denny. "So by the last week of February it's all going to be in place." "The EMEA satellite (I-4 F2) will arrive at its new location on about the second of February. On the sixth of February we're going to transfer all of the traffic off the IOR (I-4 F1) satellite onto the EMEA satellite, and move the IOR." "As a result of that, the second red shaded area will lose coverage for FleetBroadband (see diagram, right). It is a large geographical area, with a concentration of FleetBroaband users, and it's an area where we'll be working very hard to minimise the outage." The scheduled outage for this Asian coverage area is 19 days, 6 days less than will be experienced in the Atlantic, as Inmarsat will be trying to keep the downtime to a minimum by moving the spacecraft as fast as possible. "Though the ASIA-PAC satellite is moving physically the same distance as the other one, because of the concerns of trying to restore services as quickly as possible we're actually burning more fuel to do it more quickly, as we have a lot of fuel on the vehicle," said Mr Denny. "We'll switch the final satellite on about a day before it reaches its final position, to get everything up and running, and then when it reaches its location there'll be some fine tuning. But the object of the exercise is to minimise the outage, and we have a high degree of confidence that all that will be required at that stage is minimal fine tuning." If all of that seems a little complicated, the summarised version is that the current I-4 satellites at AOR-W and IOR are to be repositioned and joined by a third I-4, creating the new regions AMERICAS, EMEA and ASIA-PAC. This will cause a 25 day FleetBroadband service outage from January 7, and a 19 day outage from February 6. Vessel effects It is important to note that the outages described during the satellite repositioning apply to FleetBroadband only - all other existing Inmarsat services, be they Fleet, Inmarsat-C, mini-M or anything else, will not lose coverage in the above mentioned areas and will continue as normal. "There has been some confusion as to The FleetBroadband service outage in the red shaded area will occur for 19 days, from February 6 2009 'what does this really mean for the traditional terminals, the Fleet family and everything else out there?'," said Mr Denny. "Really, it means nothing." "Having the number of satellites we have in place has afforded us the flexibility to do this without impacting on the other services. For our E&E services this will have almost zero impact, and to do all this and keep to a small impact on services, while creating a significant enhancement of the user experience going forward, is great." One minor change that will occur for existing services will be a loss of some extra spot beam capability in the south of the Atlantic Ocean that had been temporarily available to older Inmarsat antenna systems when the services were transitioned to the I-4. "When we go from the I-4 back to (the previous generation satellite) the I-3, we will lose some of the spot beam coverage that those services had gained," said Mr Denny. "However, to compensate, we're going to illuminate some additional beams on the I-3 that we previously didn't have on, and that will significantly minimize the loss of coverage." Mr Cunningham is keen to point out that Inmarsat's backbone emergency and Digital Ship December 2008 page 14 distress communications will not suffer any detrimental effects during the repositioning schedule. "Core elements, like safety services provision, are gold plated and completely unaffected, things like Inmarsat-B, Fleet 33, 55 and 77, mini-M, Inmarsat-C," he said. "All of those services are unaffected. We have advised users that do have FleetBroadband that this would occur, so if you do have vessels trading in those areas be sure that you have a redundant communications fit to see you through that period." "It's never good to assume, but particularly as safety services like Inmarsat-C are mandatory, it's highly likely that trading vessels will have another form of Inmarsat communications onboard." Inmarsat also stresses that news of this move is not a surprise being unveiled to FleetBroadband users as the programme draws near. "We've been completely transparent since the beginning that this would occur and what the effects would be," said Mr Cunningham. "We have been talking to the users that have adopted FleetBroadband about this since just after the launch of the service to make people fully aware that if this is their sole communications device then they will need to have an alternative if they are sail- ing in the affected areas during the outage period." "But once this is done, a 19 to 25 day period out of the next 20 years, it's inconvenient but a small price to pay for the benefits that it will bring long-term to those users. The 2020 lifespan is still intact, we have the technical expertise and fuel aboard the spacecraft to have an unaffected lifespan of the satellites." As Mr Denny points out, this move merely represents a sign of the times in the changing market for satellite communications, and an attempt to evolve to meet those needs. "We had a previous configuration that met the business needs and technology as it existed at the time," he said. "This is really setting us up now for the future." "The world has moved on, and we're positioning ourselves to move with it and be there for the future with the latest and greatest technology in the right locations. There's a bit of work to do, but it's going well and we're on schedule." DS Inmarsat users wishing to learn more about the effect of the satellite repositioning and service outages should contact their Inmarsat distribution partner, or visit the Inmarsat web site at www.inmarsat.com/coverage.
SOFTWARE NEWS Digital Ship CORENA and SpecTec in Shipdex development deal www.shipdex.com Software development company CORE- NA has signed a strategic partnership agreement with SpecTec to jointly provide solutions supporting the Shipdex exchange protocol. SpecTec is one of the founding members of Shipdex, an exchange protocol for digital documentation that is based on the S1000D standard used by the airline industry. In addition to making its core product, Life*S1000D, Shipdex compliant, CORE- NA will develop additional Shipdex modules for manufacturers, ship owners and ship operators. The Shipdex modules will be marketed by SpecTec as part of the AMOS Business Suite for the shipping industry. "It is a pleasure to observe that the S1000D standard, which Shipdex is built upon, is being adopted in more and more industries," says Toralf Johannessen, CEO and president of CORENA. Giampiero Soncini, CEO of SpecTec, added: "Our joint Shipdex solutions will complement SpecTec's AMOS Solution Suite and will significantly contribute to reduced costs, increased quality and making accurate technical data available on board the ships." FuelTrax type approval from ABS www.fueltrax.com The American Bureau of Shipping (ABS) has awarded a type approval certificate to Nautical Control Solutions, for its FuelTrax Marine Fuel Management system. Introduced in 2006, the FuelTrax system connects to various flow meters, sensors, and operating devices to capture fuel transfers, report tank levels, monitor consumption, track engine condition, and show vessel location so fleet owners can optimise performance. Crews can use the data to check throttle settings for more economical operation based on current conditions, using actual engine run times or fuel usage to plan maintenance schedules, with the aim of decreasing costs and increasing vessel availability. Operations can examine fuel trends to compare routes, crews, and technologies, and ultimately connect fuel consumption to the actual work performed by a vessel. "This type approval is recognition that we are capable of consistently producing a product in compliance with applicable marine specifications," said Anthony George, CEO of Nautical Control Solutions. "Each product is extensively tested to verify that it will perform reliably in the marine and offshore environment." "This is a rigorous process and one that we enthusiastically completed. It shows our commitment to this industry and to our customers' success." In other news, SpecTec has signed an agreement to supply software systems to Brodospas and Viking Line. The first contract includes the supply of AMOS Business Suite to Brodospas, a shipping company based in Split, Croatia. The software licence includes the Maintenance and Purchase (M&P) and Quality and Safety (Q&S) modules. Initially AMOS will be installed at the Digital Ship December 2008 page 15 Brodospas Head Office in Split and onboard the Brodospas Alfa and Brodospas Beta, two AHTS 6615 vessels on order at the Damen Shipyard. Anchor Handling Tug Supply vessel AHTS 6615 is one of the latest designs from the Damen offshore series, which will be in service around the middle of next year. Before the delivery, SpecTec will develop a Maintenance and Purchase database for these two vessels and help Brodospas to integrate its Quality and Safety manuals into AMOS. SpecTec's order from Viking Line is to install its latest newbuild, the Viking ADCC, with AMOS M&P and AMOS Q&S. The vessel, a fast ferry currently being built at Astilleros de Seville in Spain, is planned to be in operation during the autumn of 2009.
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