Communicating at sea: What are the options?

The leaps in technology mean that no one needs to be alone when they’re out on the ocean. You can keep in touch with people onshore for as little as a few hundred dollars right up to having all the services you’d expect if you were in your own home.

The question is, though, what level of connectivity you’re comfortable with, factoring in things such as ongoing costs, the ability to have a two-way conversation and convenience.

How much can ship-to-shore communications vary? Let’s look at several options from the basic to the fully immersed.

This is the simplest and most widespread form of getting a message to the shore, although it’s meant to be a last resort.

Emergency position-indicating radio beacons (EPIRBs) and Personal Locator Beacons (PLBs) hook into satellites circling the world and connect with an emergency channel that is monitored around the clock.

Push the button on an EPIRB (usually attached to a boat) or a PLB (usually attached to a person) and rescuers will know you are in some sort of trouble, and exactly where you are. They can then coordinate a rescue effort that can hone in on you for as long as the device keeps transmitting – around 48 hours for an EPIRB and 24 hours for a PLB.

However, the communication is all one way, from the EPIRB or PLB to rescuers, meaning no one can get in contact with you to acknowledge the problem or let you know rescuers are on the way. Rescuers will know who owns the device, and what vessel it belongs to.

On the upside, EPIRBs and PLBs are very cost-effective to buy, meaning they’re a cheap way of adding safety to a boat. EPIRBs generally last up to 10 years before needing replacement, while PLBs last between five and 10 years.

In Australia, these emergency beacons need to be registered with the Australian Maritime Safety Authority. In order to ensure the registration information is up to date, you’ll need to re-register the device with AMSA every two years. This helps AMSA keep track of who the device belongs to if the boat it is registered to is sold.

Pros: Works anywhere in the world; cost-effective; can get you rescued at the press of a button; long-lasting
Cons: One-way communications means rescuers don’t know why you need help, nor can they let you know they're helping; need to re-register the device every two years; need to re-register if the boat is sold

If you’re a long way offshore, a VHF marine radio isn’t going to cut it. It’s because the range of a VHF radio is very limited – it needs a line of sight to work properly. If your antenna is low and the swell is big, chances are you’re not going to be able to contact anyone onshore.

A better option for heading far offshore is a HF radio, also known as a 27MHz radio because of the frequency band it uses.

While a VHF radio is limited in its range, a HF radio can reach long distances, up to 3000km in ideal conditions, by bouncing the signal off the ionosphere – a layer of the Earth’s atmosphere that is good at reflecting radio waves – and off the surface of the Earth, sort of like bouncing a superball off the floor and hitting the roof.

HF, then, is good at transmitting to places that are over the horizon and out of sight.

However, because the service uses the ionosphere, a HF radio service is susceptible to interference. That means voice may drop out as the signal is affected by everything from solar flares to lightning from far-distant storms.

On the upside, HF radio is seen as a cost-effective substitute for satellite services, with radio handsets able to give decades of reliable service.

One of the downsides of HF radio is that you need a long antenna to get a decent range; a standard whip antenna is about 3.6 metres long, and many ocean-going sailboats will use an antenna wire up to 15 metres long attached to the backstay.

You will also need a licence to operate a 27MHz radio, as the radios are quite complex to operate. 

Pros: Cost-effective communications; signal can reach long distances; radios can last a long time
Cons: Voice quality is affected by a number of outside influences; need a big antenna; requires a HF radio licence; not easy to use

If you want to be able to contact someone anywhere in the world at any time, an option is to subscribe to a satellite phone service that works just like a mobile phone.

You can have a satellite phone service as either a fixed handset much like a speaker phone, or as a mobile device that you carry around just like a mobile phone. Other devices act like a wireless hub; connect your smartphone to it and the land-based phone becomes a satellite phone.

More basic versions of a satellite phone don’t have voice support, but instead, allow users to send and receive text messages in real time.

To use a satellite phone service you’ll need a SIM card and a plan just like you do a mobile phone.

The benefit of this service is you can receive everything from weather reports to using it just like an EPIRB if the handset is equipped with an emergency call button.

Make sure the service you subscribe to has the coverage you need. Services such as Iridium offer true global coverage, but others offer regional coverage that can be quite restricted.

If you’re a keen blogger, keen to check email or addicted to TikTok, you can often pair your smartphone to a satellite phone to connect to the internet.

Pros: Can get a worldwide service; relatively low cost compared with satellite internet; can use voice or data; can have in-built or portable services; can choose between voice/text and text-only options; emergency back-up
Cons: Expenses can rack up if you overuse it; some services may be regional rather than global

The ultimate in connectivity is to have a super-fast internet service right on the boat.

Services such as SpaceX’s Starlink have jumped into this space offering internet services over most of the ocean that are as fast as if you were standing on land.

Starlink was developed in part to help SpaceX get onboard video of its rockets landing on floating platforms out at sea, handy because the rockets can then be recommissioned for another launch.

The big downside is that this interconnectivity doesn’t come cheap, with equipment costing thousands of dollars to install, and big ongoing costs to stay connected.

The plans may be capped, too, meaning once you’ve blown all your data streaming the latest season of your latest favourite on-demand streaming service, that’s it until you roll over to the next month.

Pros: Streaming internet pretty much wherever your boat can go
Cons: May have data limits; expensive to install and buy subscription plans