Correct invalid Off the Air for certain locations
This request is for Stations who happen to be in an area where on occasion there are no ships in reception range, so most station wouldnt have this issue. I report from the Middle Chesapeake area where normally there are ships; however at certain infrequent times I will show nothing for over the 30 minute time frame, where my station will be logged as "Off the Air" and I go Red for awhile. I get the advisory Email that my station is Off the Air. This kind of bugs me because I have worked to keep my station On the Air with direct connectivity to MT and my station equipment and Network equipment on UPS power. I normally run 99+ percent available but just cant get to 100% because of a lack of ships at least once every 3 months.
However I have noted something which would correct this. I continuously report Base Station contacts from US Coast Guard ground stations. They transmit strong signals which show up simply as Base Stations and are identified as a Yellow dot on the maps and no other details. I normally report 5 of them continously. They do indicate on MT which station is reporting them. These contacts are always on my Coverage Map even when my Station is shown as Off the Air because of a lack of ships. Apparently MT does not count these receptions as being on the air even when I can see that they are accepting them from me. I would like to see MT count these Base Station contacts and reports as showing the station being On The Air, which it is. Several other stations around the Middle Chesapeake would benefit as well.
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I am in the same situation as I operate a station on the Hudson River about 90 miles north of NYC. We have a steady stream of commercial and recreational traffic most of the time, but on occasion that stream dries up. In our case we do not have any Coast Guard ground stations within range, so that solution to the problem is not applicable to us. Still, the occasional incorrect report that our station is off the air is unwelcome.
I will say that it has been over four months since the last "offline" email was received, so perhaps this situation has been addressed. If so, thanks.
William Spencer
SID 1271
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I am a bit sensitive to this because I worked in an environment where being "On the Air" was the only real parameter for a successful operation. With MT there are a lot of system components globally which have to be working to be On the Air. I really value seeing my station at 100%. Numerous times I have been within a few days or a week to 100% only to have one of those times where VHF wasnt propagating well and ships just out of range. With that it will take another three months for that to flush out of the system.
I have to admit that after being at 100% available for about a month, I had a power failure and my receiver went down for a couple hours. I have UPS power on my entire home network except for the receiver which is at the opposite end of the house to be near the antenna. So, Im going to get a small UPS to take care of that.
Maybe 3 months is a little sever for this station performance parameter. Reducing to 1 month continuous operation might be a little more realistic for a mostly amateur contributor base, yet still require a station to be well designed and maintained.
For William Spencer SID 1271
I checked your Station Details and under "Show All" you are reporting on a coast guard station (yellow dot) located South of RT 301 and East of Rt 9. near the Clarence Fahenstock Park. This base Base Station only shows up in the Show All view but your station is reporting it.
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For me the problem is that the local nav-aid, which I receive constantly, is also picked up by another station and reported to MarineTraffic.com. Apparently what happens is that the first report is accepted and the second is not. So when there is no other traffic around, my station appears offline if the other station is picking up the nav-aid signal first. This is annoying to me as well, as I know that my station is "receive ready" all the time. (Well except for a week when power was out due to TS Arthur...). I would like to see this issue escalated, and I have complained to Dimitris about this before.
FYI, I am station 715, and the nearby station is 1495. The nav aid is 3160117.
Peter
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Reply to Peter Dodd Sta 715,
Its only recently that I have had overlap with another station. Station 1515 has lit up and we share a lot of territory. After three years of exclusive coverage, 1515 is stealing a lot of my thunder, ha ha. However, I feel it good that MT has overlap; as to their perspective, it improves the overall service. Certainly 1495 is going to continually overlap your area with its 60 m elevation and Phased Array Dipole
Since my original post on this subject, I have noticed that due to the ever increasing popularity of Class B AIS, there is less chance that I will be shown Off The Air. With the Fall Migration just starting, I will be good into Oct. However in the dead of Winter, Im sure I will be listed as OTA when in fact I will be reporting these Ground Stations/Nav-Aid consistently and thats going to make me grumpy.
You do raise another question I had not thought of. When two or more stations report a contact, do both get credit as far as Off the Air is concerned. I note with my new neighbor station that over a period of an hour or so, MT will give credit for the contact showing it bouncing between both stations. I would hope that if a station is providing a contact, that it is credited, regardless of which station is selected for display on the map.
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Thanks, George Gore, for your comments.
As far as I understand, if two stations report the same target, then the first is accepted and the second is ignored. So recently I am showing a lot of "offline" status. I really think that MT should at least record the second signal as meaning the second station is alive and reporting. For me, the recreational sailing season is coming to a close, and except for fishing boats out of Lunenburg (which 1495 does not always pick up) things are pretty quiet around here.
And to raise another issue, just in case others are listening, the "area covered" seems to depend on what stations have been received recently, not on the history of targets. I know that I routinely receive signals from 20-30 miles out, and with some propagation days up to 100 miles. So am I not"covering" the area?
Peter Dodd
715
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