It says in the book that the GMDSS radio station has to be located in an area that is permanently manned. For the majority of vessels it's no problem mounted on the Navigational bridge (forward) as navigating officers are here all the time. But some vessels, especially in the offshore sector have two bridges, one for navigating and the other for working. These include diving vessels and crane ships that when working have no one the forward bridge because they're all on the afterbridge. I was on a vessel that has two bridges when the GMDSS regulations came into effect and it was a struggle to find anyone that could advise us of what to do, so we managed to get an agreement that the radio room would be permanently manned so we installed it there.
I am now involved with the fitting out of a brand new large vessel with two bridges and I've been through the manuals to try to find what, if any regulations have been adopted. I have not been able to find any mention of this, so does anyone on this forum know if there has ever been any defined rules and regulations attached to this issue
Many thanks
Nigel Bailey
ETO
