Generic callsigns TEST callsigns - for test purposes PMO-III workshop – Hamburg – March 2006 Dedicated ’’callsigns’’ for VOS reports - for all operational VOS 2 issues:

TEST callsigns Aim - to be able to test the whole data transmission from a ship to NMS’s databases - to avoid the data of these reports assimilated by the models but - to make them available in the databases for monitoring purposes PMO-III workshop – Hamburg – March 2006 Establish fact - some NMSs already use test callsigns without any standardisation => it is important to rationalize

TEST callsigns Proposal : TESTccn - where ‘’c’’ is the country code and - ‘’n’’ is a 0-9 digit => 10 callsigns per country - risk close to zero to have a true callsign starting with TEST PMO-III workshop – Hamburg – March 2006 Counterproposal and additional requirements from GTS (ETs) - to use special bulletin headers => higher risk to have the data rejected from databases - to force the test data to be 24 hours old

VOS callsigns Proposal - 3 letters - or 2 letters preceeded by ‘’Q’’ - for the VOS observation type - QBT (Batos), QMN (Minos), QML (Milos), QTW (TurboWin), QSE (Seas), QSK (SeaKeepers),… QOT (Others) - 2 characters for the country code + ‘’EU’’ for EUCOS funded AWS - 2 characters for a serial ‘’number’’ (from 00 to ZZ : 36 x 36 possibilities) the lists would be maintained at a national level PMO-III workshop – Hamburg – March 2006 Examples - BATEU00, MINUK00 already used => QBTEU00, QMNUK00 - QTWDE12 (German ship using TurboWin), QMLSP00 (Milos on a Spanish ship)

VOS callsigns Advantages - for monitoring purposes : a PMO or a VOS operator may be informed of a problem on one of his ship through the unique knowledge of her ‘’callsign’’ It is not necessy to wait an update of Pub N°47 to know the NMS which is responsible for a given VOS - for performance evaluations per countries and VOS type (TurboWin, AWS…) - for compensations (E-SURFMAR concern) - for a better discretion under condition the only identifier of the ship present in WMO Pub 47 is this callsign. Only national PMOs or VOS operators would know the relationship between callsigns and ship’s names… (better solution than SHIP - also cf. Seakeeper’s practice… even if this proposal is not unique to solve the problem). PMO-III workshop – Hamburg – March 2006

VOS callsigns Drawbacks - makes foreign VOS inspections more difficult - ?? PMO-III workshop – Hamburg – March 2006