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MOBI is Revolutionizing Ship Safety
Story
Number: NNS020813-20
8/13/2002
By Journalist 2nd Class Ryan Hicks, USS Abraham Lincoln Public Affairs
SAN DIEGO (NNS) -- During its deployment, USS Abraham Lincoln (CVN 72)
will be part of the evaluation process that will change the way the Navy
handles man overboard situations.
A new three-piece system is now
in place to take the guesswork out of knowing if a Sailor is possibly in
the water.
A transmitter the size of a Rubik’s Cube, a receiver
consisting of a whip antenna connected to a small box the size of an
answering machine, and a direction finder that points out the relative
bearing of the transmitter make up the new man overboard indicator (MOBI)
system. With MOBI, the Navy is in the process of revolutionizing safety
standards aboard ships.
“The system will highly increase the
probability of discovering Sailors overboard and then quickly finding
them,” said William Dull, a representative from Briar Tek, the company
that won the bid to produce MOBI for the Navy two years ago.
This
system will be the first to use active technology for the man overboard
situation, rather than the normal passive mode of manual detection through
the exclusive use of lookouts, according to Chuck Collins, the director of
operations for the company.
Three hundred of these transmitters
have been passed out so far on board Abe, with an additional 1,200
distributed among the rest of the battle group. Sailors will wear the
transmitters in the dye-marker pouches in their float coats.
During
the deployment, the system will be evaluated to determine possible
improvements before it goes Navywide. Currently, the George Washington and
Abraham Lincoln battle groups are the only ones to use MOBI, but the Navy
plans to have it in place fleet wide sometime in 2003, said
Collins.
The eventual price tag throughout the Navy rounds out to
about $250 per Sailor.
“That’s not bad when you consider that
every float coat costs $350,” said Collins.
If Sailor falls
overboard, the transmitter will activate upon contact with salt water. An
antenna located on the O-10 level will receive the signal, which is then
displayed on a receiver on the bridge. The signal can be detected up to 18
nautical miles away.
An alarm will sound near the Boatswain’s Mate
of the Watch station, and the serial number of the transmitter in the
water will be displayed on the screen. The receiver also displays the
number of transmitters in the water in the event there is more than one
Sailor overboard.
After the signal is received, an antenna on the
tower picks up the direction of the signal and displays it on the
direction finder in front of the Captain’s chair. MOBI also comes with a
separate portable direction finder that can be attached to the rigid-hull
inflatable boat (RHIB) to help speed up the recovery when the RHIB is
deployed.
Boatswain’s Mate 2nd Class Ken Crowther, who stands the
Boatswain’s Mate of the Watch on board, said the addition of MOBI is
definitely a good thing. He also added that it should not change the focus
or function of the lookouts, though, because in the event of failure,
there still need to be eyes looking into the water at all
times.
Lt. Tom Baker, an officer of the deck (OOD) on board, was
very positive about the effect the MOBI will have on the bridge watch.
“It’s definitely a great advance in technology toward a safer working
environment,” said Baker.
“And it will make life a lot easier up on
the bridge, because the system tells the direction of the man overboard,
and that will help the OOD make the decision what kind of turn the ship
needs to make for the recovery,” he continued.
And if anyone is
worried that the system is expensive or difficult to maintain – once a
year, pop open the transmitter’s back with a Phillips-head screwdriver and
change the 9-volt battery inside.
For more news about USS Abraham
Lincoln, visit their custom Navy NewsStand page at www.news.navy.mil/local/cvn72.