Rosepoint Navigation

[Phyliss Berard]

Rose Point ECS is the industry-leading navigation software and the number one selling navigation software for inland vessels in the United States. With Rose Point ECS you get the most comprehensive user experience and sophisticated navigation tools available all in one package.

Rose Point ECS lets you plan an unlimited number of routes and waypoints, provides for boundary areas with speed limit alarms, and includes many other planning and drawing tools. Only Rose Point ECS lets you organize those routes and marks into voyage plan documents which are easily archived, printed, shared, and transferred between PCs.

Rose Point ECS streamlines every departure by consolidating the selection of a destination and route, making adjustments to your vessel and tow configuration, looking up destination codes, and updating your AIS transponder.

Rose Point ECS can automatically calculate routes on US inland waterways and will even find all the bridges, locks, and river stage stations along the way to assist in your Subchapter M Navigation Assessments.

Rose Point ECS can use the official NOAA ENC and NOAA RNC charts directly; there is no need to purchase US charts in a proprietary format. Rose Point ECS even makes it easy to download and install these free charts. Official worldwide charts are available for purchase from within Rose Point ECS.

We now offer a proven simple solution to the confusion around paperless charting! With a primary and a backup Hatteland Series X G2 System running Rose Point ECS, you can meet the requirements of the Coast Guard NVIC 01-16 for paperless charting transits.

Rose Point Navigation Systems provides commercial-grade electronic charting and navigation software to light commercial marine operators worldwide. Rose Point ECS is the industry-leading navigation software and the de facto standard navigation software for inland vessels in the United States.

This course will train individuals in the use of the Rose Point Navigation Systems Electronic Charting and Navigation software (ECS) as well as demonstrating how an ECS works in relationship to other navigational equipment such as Global Positioning Systems (GPS), Automated Information Systems (AIS) and Radar. Topics to be covered will include an overview of the ECS system, using, installing, maintaining your charts, voyage planning, configuring your vessel and its electronics.

If you already have an iKommunicate and want it to fully integrate with Coastal Explorer, make sure you download the latest firmware release but all new 2019 iKommunicates have this firmware already installed.

iKommunicate was originally designed to support the new Signal K open data format and wireless NMEA 0183 (TCP/UDP) connectivity but with the addition of the Coastal Explorer protocol, iKommunicate is fast becoming a universal gateway. At $299 (GBP220/EUR265), iKommunicate is a cost effective and efficient solution to use NMEA data on more and more devices.

Coastal Explorer from Rose Point Navigation Systems ( -explorer/) is one of the most widely used marine navigation programs for Windows PCs, with a wide range of sophisticated functionality and support for vector and raster charts.

A question came up in our online nav course about R2AK navigation. As it turns out we have worked on this route in great detail a couple years ago as we assisted the Team MAD Dog in preparation for their record setting race. I started to answer this longish question in our class discussion forum, but decided it could be of broader interest, so I put these notes here.

R2AK-1.gpx is the full route Port Townsend to Ketchikan, with logical waypoints numbered and named from start to finish. R2AK-2.gpx and R2AK-3.gpx are two short alternative legs if the main route has bad weather in these regions. [ Might have to right click and choose save, else you might look directly at the xml files.]

These files can be loaded into OpenCPN or other enav program and then studied in on the screen and on the routes manager display. Without Canadian charts, however, the details are hard to discern. The WA and AK charts are free downloads.

You can also drag these gpx files onto Google Earth to see what the routes look like in detail. There is some thought that there could be very many routes to Ketchikan, and probably so, but there is a logical direct route if weather permits.

Next we used current predictions from the Canadian Current Atlas that we customized and made into ebooks that could be loaded into their phones. Then each day and hour is a book mark, easy to find. Recall that MADDOG was all navigated from the trampoline of an open catamaran. No nav station and no other electronics.

This was an unassisted race, so they had to get their weather info underway themselves, but we could run a day or so out at least as starting points. We considered the key was getting to Seymour Narrows on time, so this was focused upon. They hit the Narrows, exactly as the current turned in their favor, flying by at 20 kts as the fishing boats hanging out for the right time were pulling their anchors.

On the other hand, after a very high tide, many of the logs that were beached find there way back into the water, and these can be a serious impediment in some channels. I have seen cases there where we had to navigate through a maze of these at dead slow. This means navigation at night in these conditions takes special care.

As always, a careful reading the the US and Canadian Coast Pilots (the latter called Sailing Directions) is mandatory for this route. The US versions are free downloads, the Canadian Sailing Directions for BCcome in four volumes. There are also numerous cruising guides to these waters with discussions of anchorages and small boat facilities.

Barges and tow boats are used for transporting dry cargo along the Mississippi River system. From the lower Mississippi up the Ohio and Tennessee Rivers, goods such as grain, coal and soy beans travel to the gulf coast for export and steel and other products come into the US interior. Navigating barges along a flowing river is a difficult task!

With Mississippi River surface velocities averaging 3 mph, increasing to 7-10mph during high flow events, river transportation requires highly skilled boat captains with accurate, up-to-date navigational information. Vessel groundings occur when available navigation data is inadequate; channel markers that delineate the navigable channel are not moved as the water level rises and falls, so at a low river stage part of the channel may have inadequate water depth for passage. Mississippi River wing dams funnel water flow creating dead spots where low velocities encourage sediment deposition, lock and dams may encourage sediment deposition below the dam, and sand bars may build up. To promote safer operations and reduce grounding incidents, one transportation company created a survey team to perform in-house hydrographic surveys of river reaches that are known to be problematic. As the river environment is dynamic, surveys need to be recent and relevant. Available published survey data loaded into the navigation system might sometimes be too old or of inadequate coverage on its own to prevent unknown hazards to vessels.

The initial survey setup used was a consumer grade echo sounder to show depths, with RosePoint ECS Navigation software connected to GPS to track the survey boat position. The channel boundary was simply marked at discrete positions with manual depth entries. The boundary was then sent to the vessel captains as supplementary navigation information to be displayed on their RosePoint S57-based display. However, the firm wanted to develop more detailed hydrographic surveys of the highest risk areas, to provide more accurate and useful navigation aids. Instead of roughly marking the channel edge, the goal was to be able to conduct a thorough hydrographic survey and generate an XYZ bathymetry surface using hydrographic mapping software that could be easily exported to RosePoint ECS and sent to captains as an overlay.

With support for more charts and chart formats than any other recreational navigation system, route planning features with multi-level undo capability, integrated gazetteer and guide books, virtual instrument display, and obstacle alerts, Coastal Explorer will help you make your next cruise safer and more enjoyable.

The gazetteer includes millions of places in the US, Canada, and Mexico and more countries are available. You can find any of these places on the chart by simply entering a name into the Search Box on the toolbar!

Guide Book information is tightly integrated into Coastal Explorer's charts. Sailing directions from the US Coast Pilot and NGA Enroute for Canada and Mexico are included. Many other guide book add-ons, including the Atlantic Cruising Club's Guides to Marinas and ActiveCaptain, are also available.

Coastal Explorer uses documents instead of a hidden database to keep track of all of your routes, waypoints, boundary areas, and other marks so you can organize them however you want. You can even share them with your friends using e-mail or a USB Flash Drive!

Coastal Explorer can predict tide levels and tidal currents at all official US stations and many Canadian stations. Tide predictions are presented in easy to read graphs along with daily high, low, and slack water times.

Virtual Instrument panels show you information from your electronics in large, easy to see displays. Coastal Explorer includes an analog compass with waypoint arrow, analog wind, cross track error, and rudder angle displays, depth and temperature graphs, and many digital display options.

Coastal Explorer lets you choose the types of charts you want to use. A complete set of US Charts in both raster and vector formats is included, and Coastal Explorer helps you keep your charts up-to-date by automatically downloading updates when they are available.

Founded in 1957, Maryland Nautical Sales is one of the largest nautical chart agents in the United States. We have in stock a worldwide selection of nautical charts (electronic & paper), books, navigation software and marine supplies. As a supplier of worldwide charts (corrected up-to-date) and publications of the U.K. Hydrographic Office (British Admiralty) since 1987, Maryland Nautical was granted its "International Admiralty Chart Agent" status by the U.K.H.O. in 1999. We are also an ISO 9001 Registered Firm.

c80f0f1006