Alert on Network Status of Newly Managed

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.