No P&O webcams working!

[tom_uk]

At the current moment, none of the P&O webcams are working: all the ships are listed as being 'Out of satellite range'. In fact, Artemis only left Southampton this afternoon, Aurora & Oriana are trekking westward through the w. Med, Oceana is in the fjords, and Arcadia was in Helsinki today (next call Copenhagen).

 

Does this happen frequently? Or could it be a breakdown at PandO HQ?

[merecat]

Oceana,s is the worst ,hardly ever on. When I was on Artemis earlier this year ,I was told the problem was a fire at the centre in the US that controlled things and because of this the ship had no communication at all with P&O at Southampton.

If thats the case ,then most of P&O ships, are out there and not in touch with home.:confused:

[soletread]

They carn't possibly have no connection with home as all satalite and communications are linked and vessels of a cruise ship size can go no where without Sat Nav

 

Also if the computers on board were working abd picking up internet/email ect; there must have been some link to the UK.

 

I would suspect the webcams operate via an independant satalite link and if there was a fire a the control centre that would effect connection

[tom_uk]

The present position (just after 12 noon BST, 29 August) is as follows:-

 

Arcadia: working; at sea in the Baltic, next call Copenhagen

 

Artemis: working; at sea in the North Sea, next call Kristiansand

 

Aurora: not working; anchored in that remote & primitive location, Palma!

 

Oceana: not working; at Olden in the fjords;

 

Oriana: working; anchored at Gibraltar.

[Pontius Navigator]

Soletread,

 

There seems to be a misunderstanding between SatNav and SatCom.

 

Sat Nav depends on a constellation of orbiting satellites that transmit a signal on a specific frequency. The ground unit, ship, car or aircraft receives signals from as many of the constellation as are visible and a computer calculates and continuous updates the positional output. A commercial hand-held GPS will have an accurracy of 20 feet or less provided it has a clear view of the sky. 20 feet is quite adequate for a block of flats like a cruise ship. The satellite transmission is between satellites and then down to earth. A ground station will also act as an uplink to correct and satellite positioning erros.

 

Sat Com on the other hand uses geo-synchros satellites in a fixed orbit at 24000 miles above the equator. A ground station will have a dish pointing at a particular satellite much as your home based TV Satellite receiver. A mobile platform, OTOH, will need a steerable dish to lock on to the best geo-synchronous statellite. This will not necessarily be the same satellite that the ground station is looking at.

 

In the sat com case the path is two-way. The ship-shore link may be direct via one satellite or multi-path through two or more or even multi-path through satellites and ground stations. The potential for signal loss is much greater.

 

On our last cruise the ship would not promise to display any particular TV programme as a particular satellite might be masked from the ship.

[merecat]

Well I,m glad you have both explained that but must tell you ,I,m non the wiser .As to the Artemis ,all I can say, this is what a senior officer told me.:)

[Pontius Navigator]

Merecat, where was Artemis at the time?

 

If the satellite it was uplinking to had a downlink to that station in the US and then a further uplink from there or transatlantic cable then failure of that 'node' would break the link.

[merecat]

We were in the Eastern Med.,actually just after we had had a fire on board ,they told us that the fire at the centre in the US had put all the computers off and they couldn,t communicate with Southampton.:)