NAV 45/13
ANNEX
Page 8
In respect of Search and Rescue operations
.5 The SMCP for search and rescue operations are relatively easy to understand. Provided that sufficient training is given to the operators and shipboard personnel, the use of SMCP in search and rescue operations should help improve the communication.
.6 There was no significant difference in the air time spent in the communication whether using the SMCP or plain language.
.7 Given that all participants in the trials are comparatively more educated and fully qualified, the practicability and effectiveness of using the SMCP for SAR communication with the those less proficient in the language, for example the local fishermen or mariners from non-English speaking countries, is yet to be tested.
Comments by ISF
The draft SMCP should be restructured so that there is a clear distinction (i.e. entirely separate Sections) between vocabulary to be used for external communications and those phrases which may be useful for internal communication between seafarers (and with passengers) on board.
Table II/1 of the STCW Code requires that deck officers should have "the ability to use and understand the Standard Marine Navigation Vocabulary as replaced by the Standard Marine Communication Phrases". It should be therefore be made clear in the foreword to the SMCP that the references in STCW 95 only refer to those sections which revise the SMNV (i.e. the sections relevant to external communications).
The draft SMCP should be made considerably shorter.
The introduction to the SMCP should make it clear that the phrases that may be useful for internal communication on board ship have been drafted as additional material to which English language teachers may refer, but which seafarers are not actually expected to learn on a phrase by phrase basis.
That the entire SMCP be subjected to a detailed review on a line by line basis - perhaps during a meeting of a Working Group that coincides with an IMO Sub-Committee meeting - so that all inappropriate use of English can be corrected.
