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LRC Pre Course Learning

Long Range Certificate (LRC) Pre Course Learning

After three days of training, the fourth day of your Long Range Certificate Course is largely devoted to the exam, which is conducted by a third party examiner from AMERC. In order to reduce some pressure on the course it is essential you complete the pre course learning and can remember all of the information below and the Phonetic Alphabet.

If you still have your book (or Ebook) from your SRC course it is worth digging it out. Please however learn everything that follows on this page.

ABBREVIATIONS

GMDSS – Global Maritime Distress & Safety System

MMSI – Maritime Mobile Service Identity

RT – Radio Telephony (i.e. voice transmissions)

DSC – Digital Selective Calling

MF- Medium Frequency

HF- High Frequency

VHF- Very High Frequency

DISTRESS PROCEDURE USING DSC

  1. Distress Vessel Sends DSC Distress Alert
  2. A Coast Station in range will acknowledge the alert by DSC (this will stop further DSC alerts sending)
  3. Vessels receiving the DSC Alert will listen on the associated channel or frequency
  4. Distress Vessel sends Voice Mayday on the associated channel or frequency
  5. Stations receiving the voice Mayday will acknowledge by voice

DSC POSITION UPDATE

  • DSC requires the vessel’s position to be input into the radio
  • If this is not automatically from a GPS then it must be done manually (at least every 4 hours)

DSC EQUIPMENT CHECKS

  • Daily- Self test (no transmission)
  • Weekly – Live test call to a suitable coast station, if within range (usually conducted on 2187.7 kHz)
  • No Test calls on Channel 70

MMSIs

DSC Relies on each vessel having a Maritime Mobile Service Identity (MMSI). This is a unique 9 digit number.

  • The first three digits (the MID) of a ship station denote the Country. UK is 232, 233, 234 or 235.
  • So a ship station might look like 232123456
  • A Coast Station starts 00, i.e. 002321234

VHF CHANNELS

There are a handful of VHF channels you must learn/remember

  • 06, 08, 72, 77 – Intership Working Channels
  • 13 – Bridge to Bridge (Navigation)
  • 15, 17 – On Board Communications (Low power only)
  • 16 – RT Distress, Urgency & Calling
  • 70 – DSC

MF RADIO FREQENCIES

  • 2177 kHz – DSC Ship to ship Routine calling
  • 2182 kHz – RT Distress, Urgency & Safety transmission only
  • 2187.5 kHz – DSC Distress Urgency & Safety Alerts only

OTHER EQUIPMENT FREQUENCIES

  • 518 kHz – Navtex
  • 406 MHz –  Cospas Sarsat EPIRB (Emergency Position Indicating Radio Beacon)
  • 9 GHz – SART (Search & Rescue Radar Transponder)

CALLS ARE PRIORITISED AS FOLLOWS

  1. Distress inc. Relay (the pro-word is Mayday)
  2. Urgency (the pro-word is Pan Pan)
  3. Safety (the pro-word is Securite)
  4. Routine

THE MAYDAY CALL & MESSAGE

  • Mayday, Mayday, Mayday
  • This is name, name, name, Callsign XXXXX, MMSI XXXXXXXXX
  • Mayday, name, Callsign XXXXX, MMSI XXXXXXXXX
  • Position XX XX XXX  XX X XXX
  • Nature of distress
  • We require Immediate Assistance
  • Number of people on board XX (& any other relevant info)
  • Over
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