Belgians Collaborate for Ostend MRCC

The Centre was commissioned by the Shipping Assistance Division of the Flemish Government and was delivered within budget by a consortium consisting of Barco, Fabricom GTI, and Tein Telecom. The MRCC was built in 16 months at a cost of 4.23m, which includes training, support and maintenance.

The consortium was led by Kortrijk based visualisation products developer Barco, which delivered the integrated operational applications and visualisation, including a display wall for the Crisis Room.

Another Belgian company, Fabricom GTI, installed the VTS as well as a hydro-meteo system and automated signalling for the port management control. Completing a Belgian collaboration, Tein Telecom installed the complete IT network and the voice communication platform which allows MRCC operators to communicate with ships at sea, as well as internal and external partners for incident monitoring.

MRCC Ostend features a Vessel Traffic Monitoring application integrated with an Incident Management System and SAR functionalities to ensure safety and coordinate rescue activities at sea. A complete operations room with five custom consoles and a chart table is manned 24/7 by at least two operators. The Crisis Room, with an additional console and a large screen display enables collaborative decision making without disturbing the operators in the adjacent room. All equipment, including PCs and displays, is administered from a server room with redundant installations.

Within the framework of the European Safety@Sea project, which aims to improve maritime safety in the North Sea region, the MRCC Ostend system architecture will be used internationally as a platform for the demonstration of new methodologies and technologies.

Examples will be to demonstrate the exchange of AIS information between all countries bordering the North Sea and the use of decision making tools for the organisation of rescue activity in the vicinity of an offshore wind farm.

MJInformation No: 22245