The 17th Coast Guard District is scheduled to conduct maintenance on its VHF radio system on Thursday from 11:00 a.m. until 7:00 p.m. During this time, the Coast Guard anticipates that there may be intermittent service outages throughout the state as the work is completed.
Due to technical difficulties, Wednesday’s scheduled maintenance was postponed.
The Coast Guard encourages all mariners throughout Alaska to remain vigilant and have a redundant means of communication with them such as:
- Emergency Position Indicating Radio Beacons and Personal Locator Beacons, which are the most highly recommended;
- Satellite messengers, which are the second-most highly recommended;
- Followed by cellphones, when in range;
- Satellite phones;
- High frequency radio communications on 4,125 kHz, 6,215 kHz, and 8,291 kHz;
- DSC-equipped radios that are registered with a Maritime Mobile Service Identity number and have GPS activated;
- Mariners that are equipped with capable radios can contact the Coast Guard through Communications Detachment Kodiak via high frequency 4125 KHz.
The 17th District encompasses over 3,853,500 sq. miles and over 47,300 miles of shoreline throughout Alaska and the Arctic.
Mariners can contact the Coast Guard via cellular or satellite phone: Joint Rescue Coordination Center Juneau at (907) 463-2000, Sector Juneau command center at (907) 463-2980, or Sector Anchorage command center at (907) 428-4100.
Mariners are reminded that Western and Northern Alaska has no VHF-FM coverage. Contact in areas without VHF/FM coverage to the Coast Guard is via Communications Detachment Kodiak on HF or JRCC Juneau by phone. Mariners are requested to relay any unanswered calls for assistance to the Coast Guard.
