Category: AIS

The first Smart Chart AIS app, a result of the very interesting U.S. government-funded Class E AIS project discussed here last August, is looking fo 100 Panbo beta testers.  Volunteers need to have an Android smartphone or tablet and should be boating in U.S. waters or at least spending time on the coast.  Here’s the Smart Chart web site and here’s the beta sign up site.  Beta feedback will happen on the SC forum, not in this entry’s comments, please.  I’ve been in the test program for a few weeks and will illustrate some of the app’s features below.  I’ll warn you, however, that there’s a major dissappointment which has nothing to do with Smart Chart’s developers…

I’m not sure that anyone has made such an effort to show me his marine electronics products as Anders Bergström, and it worked. I left Sweden very impressed with the Seapilot charting/AIS app and the AIS expertise of True Heading. But Sweden itself played a part. The country has built out an AIS-friendly infrastructure that I hope other nations will replicate, and its complex waterways often highlight why we should want them to. It’s not uncommon, for instance, to sail around a high island and find yourself in a tight channel with a large fast-moving ship…

Back in March I wrote about the Small Vessel Cooperative Tracking project that the Department of Homeland Security (DHS) entered into the Small Business Innovation Research (SBIR) program. Essentially, a DHS department called the Port and Coastal Surveillance Improvement Project (PCSI) sought out an innovative way to persuade boaters to voluntarily submit their ID’s and tracks so that various law enforcement agencies would have better situational awareness. Well, today I get to tell you about the idea that was awarded the SBIR phase two grant of about $500,000. We won’t see the results for many months yet, and there are more acronyms involved in thoroughly understanding the concept, but I think Class E AIS will eventually be a huge advance in boating safety and enjoyment…