You can literally just see where any ship in the world is
You can literally just see where any ship in the world is
I'm sure this is not a new thing, but I just found out about it, and I think it's pretty neat!
61 comments
-
-
Trivia time!
Yes, over a certain size. AIS class A transponders are mandatory on ships over 24meters. Smaller than that, and many people use them anyway because it's convenient. Many recreational boats use class B with lower transmit power.
Anyone can operate an AIS transponder in receive-only, enabling you to receive the data yourself. This is how sites like that operate - Many volunteers who receive and forward the NMEA string to the site. Hell, if you have one of those cheap USB-SDRs you can roll your own at minimal cost. Decoding the relevant NMEA strings (AIVDO and AIVDM, readable at 38400 baud) is a bit of a pain in the ass, as it's built around a 6-bit ASCII table. But I managed to do it with a perl hack once upon a time, so it's highly doable.
NB: While not legal, it's very easy to disable an AIS transponder temporarily. War ships often do this.
Tumbleweed
I'm glad you asked; A more reliable method for establishing position is by sending a position request via DSC (VHF channel 70 or MF 2187.5kHz), as that's a lot harder to disable. You're gonna need an ROC or GOC to do this legally, though. As well as a MMSI, come to think of it.
Source: I used to work with maritime comm systems, including installation of both VHF radios, MF radios, and AIS transponder. I have a GOC.
-
This guy transponds!
-
Oooh, I love this kind of comment, packed with fascinating information I don't really understand but I'm sure someone does!
-
I just got a hackrf and it has an AIS tool built in. It's real neat, I've got to play with it a while. It plots them on a map, but it's extremely low res. My city is like 4 pixels. I'd really like to be able to fix that somehow.
I've also noticed a lot of the information it reports seems wrong. Like the same boat can be reporting anchor down and 5 knots. And even more are under way with engine but 0.0 knots. I'm not a boat captain but that doesn't seem right.
It's still endless fun just reading the names of the boats as they pass
-
The ship state (at anchor, etc) is a manual setting that the bridge crew will have to change. Same goes for destination. And bridge crew has enough on their plates already, so updating it isn't exactly a priority. That's why you often see "Ch 16" set as destination, as it's basically shorthand for "If you really need to know, ask us on VHF Ch 16".
As for receiving AIS data, if you're able to decode the data, it's easy to plot it yourself. AIS messages (AIVDO is the one you're interested in) consists of several messages, and most of them contains the ships position. Every so often, the ships name is transmitted (The MMSI number is the primary identifier).
-
-
-
My boat to Santorini was cancelled and I had to show the local office my proof on ww.vesselfinder.com before the would believe me and helped me reschedule.
The were stalking about a normale minor delay but the schip was still in port, 3 hours away.
There are some really cool ships sailing around the Mediterranean.
Just look at Club Med 2
-
What a blast from the past!!!!! I worked on that ship for 4.5 months back in 2003 when it was the MSY Windsurf. Played the piano in the Lounge. Thanks for the smiles my friend!!! :)
-
-
Works for all counties except the following, who consistently disable AIS and LRIT for various reasons: China, Russia, Iran and Senegal.
So while the International Maritime Organization requires these devices be enabled, the aforementioned counties just ignore it when disabling AIS suites their purposes (Illegally changing flags during voyage, poaching, etc).
-
Pretty sure that there is a lot of military and "pirate" ships around the world that also have their transponders turned off regularly.
-
-
who consistently disable AIS and LRIT for various reasons: China
None of these are Chinese? Are you sure?
Russia
Iran
Senegal
the aforementioned counties just ignore it when disabling AIS suites their purposes (Illegally changing flags during voyage, poaching, etc).
Like, far be it for me to suggest merchant vessels don't regularly engage in shady shipping practices. But this is far more widespread than just a few countries Americans don't like
the total capacity of ships in the U.S. and U.K. registers as of 1 January 2024 is 13.2 mil. dwt and 11.1 mil. dwt respectively.
I guess two of the largest merchant navies in the world are on vacation?
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Flag_of_convenience#Wages
In 2009, the flag-states employing the highest number of expatriate-Filipino seafarers were Panama, the Bahamas, Liberia and the Marshall Islands. That year, more than 150,000 Filipino sailors were employed by these four flags of convenience.
Anyone remember which country has a deeply problematic fascist-friendly political and military relationship with the Philippians government right now?
-
-
I was perusing that map recently. Was kinda funny seeing a bunch of ships with clearly Russian names like "Admiral Yuri Dolgoruky" or "Cosmonaut Eugene Ponasenko" under Mongolian flag, of all others Yeah, the landlocked country. I guess there's nothing wrong with landlocked country owning ships, but I just could't get this meme out of my head
-
The lake is on the Russian border, so the Mongolian government operated vessels to serve in a similar capacity as the US Coast Guard does on the Great Lakes.
-
-
Link to the site?
Also you can do the same thing with planes.
https://www.flightradar24.com/-
...Except for the billionaires that lobbied to make tracking their ecological devastation illegal.
-
-
There is app for that, and icon kinda look similar to bitwarden. Not much to say, just find it kinda interesting and want to share
-
Yes this is it, my bad
-
Sweet. Was just discussing such sites..
The other day I was wondering if flight paths over large stretches of water routed along popular cargo ship routes or anything of that nature?
-
-
-
Any ship using a transponder. It's the ones that don't that are really interesting 😉
-
Or the shops that spoof their location so they can sell sanctioned oil
-
-
And they told me I shouldnt even tell people where the cruise ship I was working on cruised around, even though it would be on the passenger itenerary. "Loose lips sink ships!" 🤦♂️
It cruises around Hawaii, btw.
-
Is there any concern that pirates will use this tool to find targets?
-
Anyone can get a cheap ais receiver and plot the positions of ships around you quite easily so it doesn't really make much of a difference.
-
Not concern, certainty.
You will see transponders annotated with stuff like
- armed security onboard
- all Chinese crew
- all Muslim crew
- with armed escort
That is sending a message to pirates that they are not the right target, or not worth the fight.
-
-
TIL, thought this were only available for plane.
Also good to know Ever Given is no where near a canal now.
-
It's also available for satellites
-
-
Anybody else who finds the color choice counterintuitive? At first i was wondering, why all the ships are on land.
-
-
Yes. I thought the same. Really dumb color choices.
-
Yeah it threw me off too a bit, I like their dark mode better
-
-
-
That was a very great Internet Historian vid.
-
This seems like a good place to mention Internet Historian just dropped a hour and a half long video on the Ever Given. It starts slow but it's goddamn hilarious
-
Worth a mention is that this guy got caught plagiarizing and somehow got away with it. His vids are funny tho!
-
You're right, it is worth a mention because I forgot. That man in cave video was pretty egregious. I'm editing my link to a YouTube mirror 😡
-
-
-
-
Ayy, I just saw the Internet Historian video on that!
-
I've found it fairly inaccurate and imprecise for purposes of ship spotting. Often it even says things like "2 hours ago".
For planes meanwhile, flightradar24 is absolutely excellent.
-
Yeah, learned about this from the WhatsGoingOnInShipping youtube channel, which is useful if you're ever curious about something going on in international shipping.
-
Not Knight Boat.
-
If you’re interested in cruising (with ships, not the other kind), there’s cruisemapper.com.
-
Anyone else think this would be a fun game like geoguessr? Drop like 4 people in with a 10 minute time limit to find the best ships then you all vote on best name, best design, biggest, ect
-
Learned this from the new digimon remake, lol.
61 comments
Pirates on their way stealing a crate of shitty iphones