If you are planning to travel through sea routes or taking a cruise ship tour, then the thoughts about leaving your mobile devices and internet will make you feel worried.There were good old times when people were not addicted to their buzzing smartphones, alerts, and social media feeds. Newspapers, magazines and family or friends were the only ones who has kept them busy.
Nowadays, people are busy scrolling down their news feed on Facebook, reading their emails and chatting with their online friends. The list of online activities one can engage in goes on and on. It would not be incorrect to state that the internet and the technological advancement has become a daily norm and is affecting personal as well as professional lives at large.
To cater to diversified requirements of customers, shipping companies are now using mobile satellite services for making internet available on sea. Despite making many efforts to maintain internet speed and efficiency on ships, there are several reasons that impact the decisions of making fleet broadband available. Refer to the following points to know more about such reasons:
Internet on sea is less reliable as compared to on shore
The internet on sea will never be as good as the internet on land. This is because we have still not developed those efficient technologies and carriers that can help in offering uninterrupted internet sessions on sea.Cruise shipsuse satellite communications and an antenna on the vessel that catches the signal to make the internet work.The antennas transmit signals to/from the ships and the signals may get interrupted because of the weather conditions, coverage barriers and other possible obstacles.
The interruptions make the internet work slower and may result in no signal situations whenever affected by a storm or strong winds. Shipping companies are trying to improve the internet servicesand are now communicating with on-shore towers to provide better speed and bandwidth.If you feel that you cannot afford to lose your connection while on sea, then it is advisable to carry a pocket Wi-Fi and a remote internet connectivity device with you.
Other article you might like: Top Four Benefits of Maritime Satellite Internet for Shipboard Crew Members
Internet packages and their prices
Undoubtedly, satellites are expensive and it is agreeable that it is not possible for a single cruise line to have their private satellite in space. Therefore, cruise lines collaborates with maritime companies who fully own satellites to provide reliable mobile satellite services. Earlier, shipping companies were only taking services from mobile satellites, thus, they were investing a huge amount of money in making a working internet connection available. But currently, many cruise companies are using hybrid systems to get internet services from both satellite connections and onshore internet towers.
Shipping companies also make many efforts to come up with better packages that can offer their customers to access social media, email, websites and streaming services at better prices but the cost incurred in making the service available isn’t too less. So next time when you try to negotiate on the internet package, keep this fact in mind that not all shipping companies are getting the service at a cheaper rate.
Fixed bandwidth
Most of the companies offering fleet broadband services offer limited bandwidth for a whole ship. If you belong to that group who hates slow internet, then the best solution is to use the internet when you can expect only a few passengers to be online. If more and more people are online, then everyone will receive less bandwidth and it can result in a slow internet connection. Working on your stuff late at night or when closer to the port will help you to bring the best out of the internet service. You can also work offline on your laptop or wait for your ship to be sailing close to the shore as an alternative to avoid slower connections.
You can explore the web to know more about maritime internet and things you should check before taking an internet package from a shipping company.
