Dear Customers,
Thank you very much for your continuous support.
These days, more and more vessels are installing VSAT and FX on
brand new ones, and the ratio of vessels with satellite broadband
communication has been increasing. In line with this, a higher percentage
of vessels already have broadband lines installed when the vessel is
purchased or the vessel’s management is transferred.
Yet, in many cases, broadband communication vessels are
equipped with CrewInternet and additional devices, resulting in complex
vessel-board wiring, and the vessel-board network diagrams and
wiring diagrams have not been updated. Even when those diagrams are
handed over in advance, in some cases, those diagrams do not comprehend
the current wiring and only illustrate the intact wiring as it was when
the brand-new vessels were built.
In addition, there are cases in which previously installed VSAT equipment is
removed at the time of vessel management transition, and there are an
increasing number of instances where the complicated vessel network is
handed over to the next manager without being understood.
If such an extended vessel network is used without being understood,
there is a risk of network loops and collisions, causing the expected
communication to fail. In the worst cases scenario, the mail PC may not be
able to send email even when connected, or even file sharing or printer
access on the vessel’s PC may not be available.
Even if the on-site crews try to patch it up somehow, it will most likely make
things more complicated and confusing because for the reasons mentioned
above, in the first place, they do not have an understanding of the network wiring.
It would take a day or two for a technician to be dispatched to regrasp a
network like this where the wiring diagrams are not properly maintained.
We hereby alert you to a number of problems in the change of broadband
vessel’s management that have been occurring frequently during this year.
In principle, it is necessary to obtain as may be possible wiring diagrams from
the previous vessel owner and to confirm the current status by dispatching a
technician to the vessel when performing a management transition of a
broadband vessel. If you cannot have a technician dispatched on the
immediate date, please understand that it is needed to disconnect the
network temporarily and continue the operation connecting a stand-alone
PC and the upstream for a while, and then you need to accept the
dispatch of a technician at a later date to figure out the network.
If you have such concerns like the above, please kindly consult with us in advance.
Thanks & best regards.