The 15th meeting of the Maritime Forum Group of the working group on Frequency Management (WG FM) took place last 24-26 February in London, chaired by Jaap Steenge of the Netherlands.
The Maritime Forum Group mainly deals with issues concerning maritime mobile service and maritime radio-navigation; its activity is reported to WG FM.
The following stand out among the various issues considered at this meeting:
- accompaniment of matters associated to the International Maritime Organisation (IMO), specifically preparation of the second meeting of the subcommittee on Navigation, Communications and Search and Rescue, to be held on 9-13 March in London;
- accompaniment of the proposed revision of ERC DEC(99)01 on harmonisation of material for general operator’s certificate (GOC) and restricted operator’s certificate (ROC) exams which is undergoing public consultation, with comments expected by 13 April;
- revision of ERC/REC 31-06 on the harmonised content of certificates issued by administrations for the GOC and ROC to facilitate the mutual recognition of these certificates, which will be submitted to the 83rd WG FM meeting;
- development of a new ECC Recommendation on the use of frequencies for personal radio equipment, including automatic identification system for search and rescue transmission (AIS-SART), man-overboard (MOB) devices, automatic identification system for man-overboard situations (AIS-MOB), automatic identification systems for emergency position-indicating radio beacons (EPIRB-AIS), portable very high frequency (VHF) radios with digital selective calling (DSC) and global navigation by satellite system (GNSS);
- presentation of results ascertained and posted for consultation on the ECC website in the wake of the questionnaire, with a view to setting up a database with contacts of administrations and organisations that issue ship licences and radio operator certificates in maritime mobile service;
- questions regarding task group TG26 of the European Telecommunications Standards Institute (ETSI). Information sent to TG26 indicated that the revision of Recommendation ITU-R M.493-13 on digital selective calling system for use in the maritime mobile service is under way (in the scope of working party 5B (WP 5B) of the International Telecommunication Union Radiocommunication Sector (ITU-R) and IMO NSCR), whereby it would be useful to align TG 26’s work with the revision of that recommendation;
- standard ETSI EN 300 373, which places a 400-watt limit on output power of maritime mobile transmitting radios in single side band (SSB) operating below 4 MHz, a figure that is not consensual – its application is under study;
- spread of power line telecommunications (PLT) equipment and its possible impact on maritime radiocommunications, after results of the completed studies are presented.
