All fishing vessels need to be fitted with VHF (very high frequency) machines so that loss of lives faced during Cyclone Ockhi could be avoided in future, a top official of the Indian Coast Guard said.
“There was a meeting of the Ministries of Home, Defence, Fisheries and Animal Husbandry following the Ockhi disaster and they looked at ways to avoid casualties and the measures to be undertaken,” S. Paramesh, IG - Operations, ICG said.
The official said it was imperative that all fishing vessels be fitted with VHF machines, so that messages could be relayed to several vessels in the sea.
“That way a message can be communicated to a vessel that is 20 nautical miles in the sea, which then will pass it on to another vessel, say 15 nautical miles further in the sea, and so on,” he said.
According to the Coast Guard, a number of fishermen were in the sea long before Cyclone Ockhi hit the region. The lack of proper communication channels could have played a role in the high number of casualties.
“In fact, we activated the International Safety Net during Cyclone Ockhi, under which a message was sent out to all vessels that were in the region. Due to this, as many as 29 lives were saved by merchant vessels,” the official added.
