MARITIME
RADIO
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WORLD

latest updates 29 April 1998

Sweden
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- Gothenburg Radio
- Stockholm Radio
- Stockholm Radio website

Coast Station Index

latest updates 29 April 1998

Gothenburg Radio
In 1973, a major reorganization of the Swedish coast radio station network was started, closing the smaller MF only stations and concentrating services on the remaining three stations, which were also the Maritime Rescue Coordination centres (MRCC, Gothenburg Radio in the west, Stockholm Radio in the east and Harnosand Radio in the north.

In the 70's and 80's there was massif investment in Gothenburg Radio turning the station into one of the most modern and sophisticated coast station systems. It became particularly well known for the "Maritex" automatic telex system which was a world leader and remains highly thought of.

The first years of the 1990's brought completely unexpected changes. Until then it would have been considered quite safe to bet money that Gothenburg Radio, on the basis of the massive investments made in the 1970's and 80's, would be last remaining coast station in Sweden.

The changes started with an indication by the Swedish Marine Administration that they saw no further need for Harnosand Radio as an MRCC. The coast station management therefore launched a crash project to remote control Harnosand from Stockholm Radio, which became effective on 31st March 1993, followed by a further project to redesign and upgrade the two
remaining stations. Only a few months into this project, the Maritime Administration, declared that they had decided to operatethe Gothenburg MRCC under their own regime, and that any involvement there with commercial coast radio was neither wanted nor necessary. The coast station management again reacted without delay with a project to close all manual operations at Gothenburg and, as soon as the new switching infrastructure was delivered and installed, to transfer all coast station operations to Stockholm Radio. This was completed in the autumn of 1994 and only weeks later the Goteborg Radio coast radio services became history.

Today the Gothenburg MRCC is operated and staffed by the Maritime Administration and, although not co-located with any coast station, it shares the same systems architecture and radio network. The Gothenburg MRCC has several operating positions connected to the coast station control system by means of a fibre-optic data and telephony trunk.