January 26, 2006
NOAA data now uploaded to "Charts-on-Demand" supplier
The 2005 Atlantic hurricane season set all kinds of records, including the first season with 26 named storms, the first with 13 hurricanes, first with three category-five hurricanes, and the first with four major hurricanes hitting the U.S. The storms left behind incredible devastation that we are all aware of. But what impact might storms have on you – even months later – as you set sail for the vast open-sea and coastal areas that were hit?
According to NOAA’s Richard Sillcox, who is Chief, NOAA Chart Update Service, “There are the obvious immediate dangers and changes right after the storm, such as debris, and aids to navigation which have been destroyed. But there can be very dramatic, permanent changes also that sailors must be aware of. Sailors can only know of such changes – and sail safely – if they update their nautical charts based on our Notice to Mariners, or, better yet, if they get new charts. We now download updates daily to a new digital printing service bureau which prints NOAA-approved charts on demand. They’re always 100% up to date at the time of printing.”
“Notice to Mariners” Issued by NOAA
NOAA, a huge organization involved in many aspects of marine and aviation data collecting, acts fast after catastrophic storms to survey damaged areas and report on changes. Sillcox states, “Immediately after a major storm we work with the U.S. Coast Guard and the Army Corps of Engineers to identify damage to navigational aids, sunken vessels, obstructions, changes in channel depths and the like. With the help of the Coast Guard we issue Notice to Mariners quickly and constantly as we get the information, so that even a week or so after a catastrophic event we are starting to issue our Notices.” In fact, within eight weeks after Hurricane Katrina hit the Gulf coast, more than 270 changes to NOAA nautical charts had been issued for that area by NOAA, says Sillcox. These updates were immediately available to sailors and mariners via NTMs or print-on-demand charts.
Of course, hurricanes can play havoc with the sea bottom also, rendering depths and obstructions on navigational charts obsolete. “Depths can change, so can contours,” says NOAA’s Sillcox, “especially in more shallow areas such as many parts of the Gulf of Mexico and around the many barrier islands in the Atlantic.” As soon as it is safe to do so, the Corps focuses on surveying federal channel depths while NOAA’s Ocean Service’s Office of Coast Survey and their Navigational Response Teams use sophisticated sonar equipment to survey depths further out to sea, as well as changes in obstructions. “And we don’t wait for the surveys to be completed before issuing updates to nautical charts,” says Sillcox. “Our Notices to Mariners are qualified and issued quickly, on an ongoing, weekly basis.”
OceanGrafix Now NOAA Partner
But how do such updates get into the hands of sailors quickly, and how long is it before new NOAA nautical charts are printed? Thanks to a “print on demand” initiative that NOAA now participates in, its updates are downloaded daily to a Minnesota-based company, OceanGrafix, which pioneered the digital printing of up-to-date, full-size NOAA charts at a moment’s notice. NOAA began a cooperative research and development project with OceanGrafix in 2000. “We were proud to partner with NOAA to develop this new technology,” says OceanGrafix president Dave DeGree. “When commercial mariners and recreational boaters can get the very latest cartographic data, up to date at the push of a button, it ensures safer sailing.”
The print-on-demand charts are available through about 40 authorized agents nationwide, many of which have proprietary OceanGrafix printers on site. There are 14 agents alone in the Florida, Gulf and Texas areas that were affected by the ’05 hurricanes, and most of these agents have remote printers. If agents do not have an on-site printer, they order customers’ charts through OceanGrafix, which ships the charts within 24 hours. No inventories of charts are kept; charts are printed to order, ensuring the very latest cartographic data.
New charts recommended by NOAA
NOAA’s Richard Sillcox states that the latest nautical chart information is critical, especially in areas which were hit by hurricanes, or even the brutal nor’easters which hit the east coast in colder months. “Big storms cause shifts in sediment and sea bottoms, not to mention obstructions that change location. Sailors are safest when they have the latest chart information and we recommend new charts each year, especially in storm-ravaged areas."
Katrina example: on-demand charts shipped fast
Within a few days after hurricane Katrina, a contracted military supply vessel loaded with emergency supplies was to head out of Baltimore Harbor for New Orleans. The vessel’s captain contacted his chart agent, Baker Lyman & Co. of Houston, an OceanGrafix agent. Within 48 hours more than 250 up-to-date charts of the Eastern seaboard and the Gulf had arrived on board. Says Baker Lyman’s Fred Cheney, “OceanGrafix worked on Labor Day to print and ship the new charts within 36 hours. The captain felt a lot better knowing he had the latest charts on board, charts that did not have to be manually updated.”
NOAA’s Richard Sillcox emphasizes, “Safety at sea is paramount to NOAA. The difference in terms up-to-date information between older, pre-printed charts and the on-demand charts printed to order, is like night and day.”
Data downloaded daily
OceanGrafix stays on the lookout for ways to improve their systems also. According to Larry Kocon, New Business Development Manager for OceanGrafix, “We’ve upgraded our software to guard against interruptions which can occur during high-speed internet transactions or unauthorized tampering. And we now download the data for all 1,040 NOAA/Coast Guard nautical charts to each of our remote print sites every night, even weekends, so each site maintains updated NOAA information, ready to print.”
In 1807, President Thomas Jefferson created the Survey of the Coast and mandated that the federal government provide navigation services to aid in safe sailing. He would be proud of the advances made in coastal surveying, and in communicating nautical chart changes via today’s modern communications and printing means.
