Inauguration Maritime Rescue and Co-ordination Center Ostend

The new Maritime Rescue and Co-ordination Center (MRCC) in Ostend has been inaugurated. The MRCC, which is now fully operational, is the first registration facility for accidents at sea along the Belgian coast. The center was commissioned by the Shipping Assistance Division of the Flemish Government and was realized within budget and forecasted planning by a multi-disciplinary consortium of Barco, Fabricom GTI and Tein Telecom. The official opening ceremony was attended by Kris Peeters, Flemish Minister for Public Works, Energy, the Environment and Nature, and Renaat Landuyt, Federal Minister of Transport and the North Sea. The MRCC project was realized in 16 months and the center came to live operations on 1 June 2006. The consortium of Barco (project leader), Fabricom GTI and Tein Telecom carried out the entire 4.2 million Euro (5.0m US$) project, including program management, design, implementation, installation, training, support and maintenance. The MRCC Ostend features a Vessel Traffic Monitoring application integrated with an Incident Management system and Search and Rescue functionalities to ensure safety and to coordinate rescue actions at sea. The MRCC in Ostend is the central check point for incidents at sea, including persons and vessels in need, accidents and oil pollution. The center, equipped with the latest monitoring and communication technology, will play a very important role in maintaining the safety and environmental friendliness of Belgium's coastal waters and in providing the best possible response and accommodation in case of an incident. The MRCC acts as information and communication hub. As such, it is collecting information from different input sources, such as radar, Automatic Identification System (AIS) tracks and hydro-meteo information. This data is again being dispatched to various clients, including SafeSeaNet, a European Platform for Maritime Data Exchange. In the European Safety@Sea project, which aims at improving 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.