DSC Test Stations

The coast stations for the weekly DSC test call: the nearest to you, the bands each watches, and whether they have been answering lately, from ships’ own reports.

Your position — degrees and minutes

Sorts the stations nearest first, and gives the distance sent with a report, rounded to 50 nm. The position itself is never sent.

Stations — loading

Tested one? Tap its band to report it.

answering mixed not answering lately not yet confirmed

Loading the list…

How the colours work, and what is sent

From ships’ reports. Each ship counts once a week per station and band, with its last answer that week. Reports fade by half every 30 days, and each ship is worth one fresh vote at most. Every band starts green, as if three ships had reported it answering, so one report cannot move a colour; a band nobody reports on drifts back to green over a few months.

Not yet confirmed (grey). A station seafarers named but nobody has tested through the app yet. It stays grey until two ships have reported on a band, then starts from even.

Reports from this page count as half a ship, by the same rules. MF reports from beyond 500 nm are left out.

The bands faded are usually out of reach from your position at this time of day: too close for the band to come down, too far, or usually closed at night. A rule of thumb; season and the sun move it, so a band just beyond its usual range is not faded but marked at the edge of reach. Each band is measured to the site that receives it, which is not always the nearest: a station's HF receiver may stand far from its MF one.

What is sent: the station’s MMSI, the band, answered or not, the hour of the test, and the distance rounded to 50 nm, worked out here in your browser. Never your position. For a station not on the list, the name you type, for review only. Your address is checked by Cloudflare against scripts, then kept only as a one-way code for the limits (five reports a day; one per station and band an hour). See the privacy policy.

What this is. A list of coast stations and what other ships have reported. It is not an official list: the Admiralty List of Radio Signals and the station’s own notices govern. Test calls follow ITU rules and your company’s procedure, and the Master remains responsible for the ship’s GMDSS.