Written messages

One of the oldest methods of remote communication still exists today. One writes a message on a piece of paper and has it delivered to the recipient. For the sailor at sea, this meant receiving letters and important messages at ports where the vessel stopped or from friendly vessels encountered along the way. In some cases, it could take months or even years for a message to reach the addressee.

An even slower and less reliable way to deliver a written note was to seal it inside an empty bottle and throw it overboard, letting wind and current carry it where they would. With time and luck, some person might actually find and read the note. Flags, semaphores, and other systems

For centuries written correspondence remained the most reliable way to get messages across long distances. However, there were much faster ways for vessels to send simple messages while within sight of the shore or other vessels. Through the use of signal flags and semaphore, a message could be sent to anyone who could see it and understand it. Since these messages were visible to everyone nearby, elaborate codes were developed to identify the sender and recipient and to hide the meaning of the message. When Samuel F. B. Morse developed one of the first practical telegraph systems in 1837, he also designed a code for it in which different combinations of dots and dashes represented letters of the alphabet. Although the telegraph, which required a continuous wire linking the sender and receiver, was useless to mariners, Morse Code was very useful: The heliograph was a bright lamp with a shutter that could be opened and closed to produce a sequence of long and short flashes corresponding to Morse's dots and dashes.

Radio

While early sailors relied only upon written messages, signal flags, semaphores, and a few other signaling techniques to communicate, the twentieth century brought major change to communication. In 1901 an Italian inventor named Marchese Guglielmo Marconi transmitted a radio signal across the Atlantic Ocean, and by 1910 the United States had passed a law requiring its passenger ships to have radio equipment on board. Radio made it possible, for the first time, for a vessel out of sight of land or other vessels to keep in touch with the rest of the world. Radio did not immediately eliminate the need for more traditional signaling systems, however, and many of them, including semaphore and heliograph, were in active use through World War II. Even today, signal flags are carried aboard most large vessels and many smaller ones. Still, radio had a profound impact on communication throughout the world, and particularly on the way sailors communicate. Today, it would be understandable if a lone sailor went to sea without a complete set of signal flags, without any knowledge of Morse Code beyond the familiar pattern for SOS (... - - -...), and without any whistles, horns, drums, bells, or signaling canon. A sailor planning to set out without a radio, however, is likely to receive shocked and skeptical looks from others.

VHF

Today there are two basic kinds of radios found aboard ocean-going vessels. Marine VHF (very high frequency) radios require an uninterrupted line of sight between antennas. This limits their range, and they are usually used to communicate over distances of less than about [x] nautical miles. Most marine radio traffic occurs over VHF radio, since skippers are naturally most concerned about vessels, port facilities, and hazards in their immediate vicinity.

SSB

To communicate over very large distances, especially while a vessel is at sea, many pleasure craft and virtually all commercial and military vessels are equipped with Marine SSB (single side-band) radio. SSB has a much greater range than VHF because it does not require a line of sight between stations. Its signal " bounces" in the earth's atmosphere, enabling it to reach around the planet's curved surface for thousands of miles. Transmitting on SSB requires a great deal of electricity compared to VHF, however, since its signal must be strong enough to travel over great distances through a lot of atmosphere. Northwest Spirit is equipped with both Marine VHF and Marine SSB.