Search And Rescue Signals and Getting Adrift Sailboats Back To Their Owners

[keepitsimple]

I'm a sailor. Love sailboats and just about everything to do with them. I think there is something that can be done when a sailboat goes adrift after the coast guard rescues the crew. For instance, after the "perfect storm", the sailboat portrayed in the movie washed up on the NJ coast, and was put back into service for little cost by the owner. Most such stories don't have that good an ending. I want to change that. I'm putting together a team to go out and rescue sailboats for their owners. Most in the sailing community think there's little return-on-investment for such a venture. It takes a lot to go far and bring a boat back. I'm committed to it anyway.

There are many pieces to put in place, one of them is being able to hear when a ship is in distress. The advent of EPIRB emergency beacons with integrated GPS helps. I need to know when an EPIRB call goes out, so I can assemble the team and equipment and go get the sailboat once it's safe to do so.

How would you go about receiving the EPIRB signals? I'm focusing mainly on the East coast of the US, until such time that we can grow the service.

For those who can already receive these signals, does this effort interest you?

 

[OceanaRadio]

Everytime dumb-and-dumber venture their small sail yacht out into weather they had no chance of coping with, the abandoned vessel remains their responsibility. If it is an environmental hazard, a hazard to shipping, or just an eyesore on a public or private beach, the owner is responsible for the cost of it's removal. Sea Tow, Boat-US and other commercial salvage companies have access to the equipment necessary to recover a vessel. It doesn't matter if it's a total loss or not, the owner remains responsible. If the owner had good insurance, they may be covered for most of the cost of recovery. If divers have to be deployed to remove fuel from a sunken vessel, the cost can be astonomical.

Even if you could receive SARSAT alerts, which you cannot, the location of a distress beacon is in most cases published in broadcast notice to mariners. The EPIRB is always recovered and turned-off during the rescue/recovery efforts. Thereafter, in open waters the adrift vessel is subject to the winds, tides and currents and would not remain in the general area for long, if it remained afloat. In nearby local waters, or if it comes ashore, the CG, or Marine Resources authority of jurisdiction dispatch a contractor immediately. The owner, if known, is billed, unless they made immediate recovery plans that were acceptable to the authority with jurisdiction. Admiralty Law and salvage rights are very complicated, and it would be foolish to assume that you could act like a pirate and just snatch any vessel you find and then negotiate a price for its return. Sea Tow and others are occassionally likened to pirates for the price their recovery can command, but they have made large capital investments and are trained and insured for the work they do. Of course Good Samaritans do it for free every day, when it doesn't put their own vessel or crew into peril. The CG and CG Auxiliary, or Police/Fire may also tow a vessel home if it doesn't imperil their vessel, and there is no urgent call for their services in the meantime, and a commercial tow was not readily available.

R/
Jack

 

[keepitsimple]

Yes, there are many difficulties.

Somehow I'm committed to it anyway.

 

[SCPD]

You've probably already done this, but make sure to check out the internation maritime laws regarding salvage operations.

 

[rfradioconsult]

Isn't USCG policy not to leave unmanned vessels adrift at sea? In the past they would sink such vessels to keep them from becoming hazards to navigation or trigger others reports that would cause another search.

 

[OceanaRadio]

Isn't USCG policy not to leave unmanned vessels adrift at sea? In the past they would sink such vessels to keep them from becoming hazards to navigation or trigger others reports that would cause another search.

rfradioconsult,

You are probably confusing news stories you have heard regarding seizure of vessels containing illegal drugs. When the flag-state of a registered vessel denies registration of the vessel, as is policy for any vessel found smuggling illegal drugs (or people), the USCG can declare the vessel to be without a state, and then may sink it as a "hazard to navigation". They do not destroy private property from which passengers were voluntarily evacuated, and in many cases will tow the vessel to the nearest port.

R/
Jack

 

[rfradioconsult]

I should have been a bit clearer; vessels that are disabled and would not be in good enough shape to safely tow, nothing to do with drug interdiction. Disabled unsafe vessels on the high seas can pose a significant hazard to shipping.

 

[keepitsimple]

Any thoughts in scanning for the distress signals? How big a dish would it take?

 

[redneckcellphone]

The dumb and dumbers that leave their boat forget to realize that it might actually not be sinking. Just look at the Sidney to Hobart a number of years back and see how many of the abandoned boats were recovered. I remember on one of the boats of the three guys on board 2 were conscious and jumped ship never to be found again. The guy that was on the boat when he eventually gained consciousness had no clue where he was or where the other people went.

Now to your question whether you can recieve the epirb signal, never unless you do some hacking. The signal when it is broadcast gets picked up by a satellite and transmitted to the coast guard. the only way you will know about people that are in distress is if the coast guard tell anyone listening on the vhf to be alert and report any sighting to them. You might be able to spot a distinctive line on the radar from a sart(search and rescue transponder)

and the radar signal

I do believe that the coast guard for safety sake sinks the boats after it rescues the crew.

IMO:
I wouldn't risk my life to go out and save a boat for a few thousand dollars. Whats to say the owner wants to pay the money?

 

[jack103]

Wackers on the water!!!! LOL

 

[NML-21]

The COSPAS-SARSAT is owned and ran by NOAA, not the USCG.
The SARSAT function is on the weather sats hence why NOAA has control of them.
You will never gain access as a civilian to the COSPAS-SARSAT system, unless you work as a civilian at a RCC (Rescue Coordination Center) for the USCG or the US Air Force.
The main reason is, if they allow you access, then they also have to allow everybody else access. Not gonna happen, especially since we all hate ambulance chasers. Not saying that you are an ambulance chaser, just giving you a reason why the general public will not have access to this system.

Could you imagine if the News Agencies were able to get a hold of this information, and while the US Coast Guard is attempting to launch resources and configure search patterns and at the same time being bombarded by calls from the press for information.

Yeah, not gonna happen.

I would suggest buying a Marine HF/SSB and a VHF Marine w/ DSC and listen. That is all I can tell you.

 

[OceanaRadio]

The COSPAS-SARSAT is owned and ran by NOAA, not the USCG.
The SARSAT function is on the weather sats hence why NOAA has control of them.
.

The COSPAS system originated by the Soviets goes back some three decades, and for the first two decades was superior to the SARSAT componments that the US and other partners could field for receiving emergency beacon reports. This was once true even in our own hemisphere, where the majority of SAR alerts from emergency beacons was provided to us from the Soviets and later Russians.

Now just rambling; I suspect NOAA's part is likely limited to their GOES SAT's, and administration of U.S registration of beacons, with each participating country responsible for their own registrations in accordance with the COSPAS-SARSAT and GMDSS treaty agreements. The international SAT components outnumber the birds owned or administered by NOAA and NASA, and the U.S is just a player in the COSPAS-SARSAT system. Like GMDSS whjich it supports, it's not something any single country owns.

Still rambling; In the U.S. at least, a distress signal is not protected communications, and while I originally advised the poster that he could not receive the signals, that's not necessarily true if he had the proper equipment. It would depend on whether the SAT that received the distress alert sent it's relay to an earth-station via encrypted signal, or in the clear. Phone-pirates hack maritime and other comunication satellietes all the time, and the 406 MHz EPIRB signals sent to COSPAS-SARSAT are definitely not encrypted. EPIRB's can be received by anyone within UHF range for obvious reasons. What comes out the SAT-end may or may not be digitally encoded, or encrypted, I don't know. There is certainly no reason to prevent the public from hearing that, as any 406 distress received by an earth-station is IMMEDIATELY sent out to the maritime community as soon as the relevant RCC can process it.

R/
Jack

 

[zz0468]

Wackers on the water!!!! LOL

hahaha!