What is a MMSI number and why do I need it?

by Ann Hoffner A wellfound sailboat making its way across the South Pacific strikes a whale; within minutes water enters the bilge. It’s impossible to find the source and those on board decide to seek assistance. The crewmember assigned to communications hurries to the nav station, pushes the red distress button on the VHF radio. Why did they do that? It’s only a short range radio, how can it help from the middle of the ocean? Because the red button means its equipped with digital selective calling (DSC), and pushing that button automatically sent out a message and will keep…
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Is there a piece of marine electronics that does so much yet has such a non-descript name? The multifunction display, usually dryly shortened to simply "MFD," is a powerhouse that can combine electronic charts, AIS, radar, GPS, voyage planning, tide data, performance instrument display, depth sounder display, engine gauge displays and a lot more. The MFD is more of a "Houston mission control" on your boat than some anonymous three-letter acronym, which is usually better suited to black box units that reside unseen behind a bulkhead. An example of the kind of power features available to MFDs was recently announced…
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