Search and Rescue Communication Exercise between Vietnam MRCC and foreign MRCC

In the morning of 06th March 2024, in Hanoi, the Vietnam Maritime Search and Rescue Coordination Centre organized the Search and Rescue Communication Exercise with MRCC Mumbai and MRCC Singapore.

The participants of the drill exchanged and handled the SAR information via telephone, fax, and email in English, with 03 tabletop scenarios:

Scenario 1: A national flag vessel of Vietnam is navigating through the sea area of Singapore and has flooding in the engine room and is in danger of sinking; the captain declares that they will abandon the vessel and require emergency assistance; the communication signal is lost right after the alert call. After half an hour, MRCC received an EPIRB alert from this vessel; they quickly processed the Singapore SAR operation.

Scenario 2: A national flag vessel of Vietnam is navigating through the Search and rescue region of India (Mumbai SRR) and has a fire in the engine room. Three sailors have severe burns, and the captain requests emergency assistance immediately.

Scenario 3: An Indian vessel navigated through the Vietnam SRR, due to the bad weather, flooding occurred in the hold, making the ship heavily listed to the starboard side and not under command. The crew was in danger. The captain requested that Vietnam MRCC do the SAR operation immediately.

Vietnam MRCC organized SAR communication exercises as per recommendation by IMO and related IMO conventions such as SAR 1979, SOLAS 1974, and UNLOS 1982./.

Some pictures of SARCOMEX among Vietnam MRCC and Singapore MRCC, Mumbai MRCC