By Kyle Mizokami
People on social media have been tracking and tweeting the locations of U.S. Navy ships, including parts of the aircraft carrier USS Ronald Reagan's task group visiting Hong Kong. It's all made possible by the Navy's new policy about using its navigational locators, which was put in place after a couple of recent high-profile collisions between Navy vessels and commercial shipping.
In the wake of the embarrassing smash-ups between the guided missile destroyers USS Fitzgerald and USS McCain and civilian merchant vessels, the U.S. Navy instructed its warships to turn on their Automatic Identification System (AIS) locators while in high-traffic areas. AIS allows other ships in the area to know a ship's location, though it's no substitute for watch-standers and radar.
AIS data is also collected by a number of web sites, including MaritimeTraffic. According to Stars and Stripes, USS Reagan was broadcasting her AIS signal while sailing through Hong Kong waters (one of the most notoriously crowded waterways in the world). The South China Morning Post, reported that USS Reagan dropped anchor off Tsing Yi island and that ferries were bringing her crew ashore for liberty.Once stopped, Reagan apparently stopped broadcasting and is now invisible on the AIS system. However, Reagan's escort, the guided missile destroyer USS Chaffee, still has her AIS on and is currently docked at Hong Kong's China Merchants Wharf Pier. Here's the Chaffee's profile on MaritimeTraffic, and clicking on the lower left hand side of the profile will geolocate the ship's current position.
We figured this would happen when we heard the Navy's initial announcement about AIS. But does any of this tracking increase risk for the Reagan and her ships? Almost certainly not. Clearly the Navy thinks there is nothing useful a potential adversary can learn from knowing the ship's location while steaming to a liberty call. It's also important to point out that the AIS signal policy only applies during peacetime and in high-traffic zones. In the middle of the Pacific, or in the event of war, AIS will obviously be turned off.
http://www.popularmechanics.com/military/navy-ships/news/a28486/social-media-users-track-us-navy-ships-visiting-hong-kong/
