RADAR Renewal before License Renewal

My RADAR renewal is due in Feb 09 and my License is due for renewal Sep 09. Can a hold a RADAR renewal Certificate and still sail on my license up to Sep 09? Sounds logical but that may not apply here! Where’s the guidance? Thanks for your comments in advance!

Come on folks! Someone must have been through this situation before, or have I stumped everyone? (Back to the top!)

<P>You’re ok if you’re in the 8th District. A Lt. or CWO would question you on it during a vessel inspection and advise you to get it on your license asap but he’s not going to push the issue if you can present the radar recertification on the spot. You will be strongly encouraged to get it on your license but no enforcement action will be taken against you. <br><br>When you renew in September try to coax them into giving you the extra months on the radar certificate so that it co-incides with your license expiration. Since it is in the same year, you can probably get them to do it. To convince them you’re not trying to pull any BS with them, offer to give up the months on your license to match your radar certificate? They don’t want to see you anymore down there than you want to see them. I don’t know if a final rule is out on this matter but that’s the way it was being handled a year or so ago. Hope this helps.</P>
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I have done this years ago hoping i could get it added to my license but they will not do it you will have to retake radar within your renewal time and submit all together but they may let you renew early to have it all together.

You are allowed to request a one-time extension on the radar endorsement of up to 2 years to make it coinicide with your license expiration. See 46 CFR 10.480(k). Of course you’d have to apply for this extension before your current radar expires, and that may be what you’re trying to avoid, so maybe this won’t help you.<br><br>Also, the Coast Guard recently published its intent for rulemaking that will do away with printing the radar endorsement expiartion date on the license. You will still need to take a renewal course no more than 5 years after the last renewal, you just won’t have to apply to the Coast Guard to change the expiration date. It also means you’ll have to carry your training certificate with you to show your radar is current. The final rule is in process in Coast Guard HQ and should be published soon.<br><br>James D. Cavo<br>Chief, Mariner Training & Assessment Division<br>USCG National Maritime Center<br><A href="mailto:James.D.Cavo@uscg.mil]<font color=#3354aa>James.D.Cavo@uscg.mil</font></A>

Thanks guys, the date I have on my license is an extention. If this rule Cavo writes about goes in effect in the next few months that would solve things.

So let me get this straight.<br><br>-License due for renewal 2011<br>-Radar was due to expire in NOV2008 but I just recently renewed my Radar (something like two weeks ago)<br><br>If push came to shove an inspecting officer could make a stink about it not being on my license?<br><br>I figured I’d just have to suck up an additional Radar renewal just before renewing my license in 2011.<br><br>Anybody here NOT carry all the relevant certificates such with them?<br><br>John sends from NORVA<br><br>

I had the exact same issue with my license and radar. I went to an MEBA dispatcher and she told me I wouldn’t be able to sail without a valid (unexpired) radar certificate. If it’s expired, it’s expired which is pretty straight forward. I took the one day renewal course at the MEBA School and then went to the USCG in Boston with the cert. They issued me an endorsement that I carried with my license. They told me the cert alone is not enough.<br><br>I have since received a new license. The bottom line is if your radar is expired so is your license. Take the course and then bring your cert to the Coast Guard otherwise you’re taking a risk and some companies our unions just won’t ship you. <br><br>

Let me throw out another consideration. The radar expiration date is also on your STCW cerificate. You may find it harder to convince a foreign port state control official to let it go than you would with a USCG inspector.<br><br>This discussion prompted me to remind the people who issue the documents here at NMC to make sure that iof we stop putting the expiration on the license, we also stop putting it on the STCW certificates. Seems obvious, but I don’t take anything for granted.<br><br>James D. Cavo<br>Chief, Mariner Training & Assessment Division<br>USCG National Maritime Center<br><A href="mailto:James.D.Cavo@uscg.mil]<font color=#3354aa>James.D.Cavo@uscg.mil</font></A>

Has there ever been any serious consideration to rolling a radar recertification into an ARPA certification? It might make too much sense.

When I went to ARPA school the first day of it was RADAR recert. And that’s the date I’m working from now. I think the idea of these RADAR dates being removed from the license and STCW cert has merit. I presently carry all my differnet school grad certs with me all the time anyway.

There’s merit to combining radar and ARPA, the lines between them are pretty blurred now as the are radars that are not classed as ARPAs, yet they can do most if not all that an ARPA can do. Yet the users of these full-featured non-ARPAs do not need training on functions like target acquisition, trial manuever, etc. The differnece between an ARPA and a radar with collision avoidance capabilities may be something like screen size or the type of menus and display controls. The functionality may be identical.<br><br>However I don’t see it happening soon. For one, it has become very difficult for the Coast Guard to get DHS to move forward on any regulatory projects, especially if they don’t have a direct connection to security. Also, there are lot more vessels and mariners using the full featured, non-ARPA radars than those on vessels required to have an ARPA meeting ther requirements in 33 CFR. So this will be perceived as making a lot of mariners on vessels under 1600 GRT get more training.<br><br>James D. Cavo<br>Chief, Mariner Training & Assessment Division<br>USCG National Maritime Center<br><A href="mailto:James.D.Cavo@uscg.mil]<font color=#3354aa>James.D.Cavo@uscg.mil</font></A>

<P>My radar expires next August. I will be sailing 4 months on and two months off next year- out of the country. After reading this thread I took a recert course yesterday. One less hassle to deal wiith next year.</P>

I took a radar renewal class a little over a week. I called the NMC and asked what I should do considering my license in valid through January 2012, however, my radar endorsement expires in January 2009. They indstructed me to take it to my local REC. So today I drove about an hour into manhattan. When I arrived I spoke with a security guard and asked him if there was any paperwork to fill as far as getting the radar endorsement taken off my license. He said no (i assumed he was wrong because there is always paper work to be filled out, especially when dealig with an REC), and just to register and wait for an evaluator. After a half hour of waiting I was summoned up to meet with an evaluator. She was probably the rudest person I have ever had to conduct any sort of business with. On top of being rude and miserable, her black sweater was covered in dandruff as if she had just walked in from a snow storm (it did snow a little today so maybe that was it, but the whole time I was there it never melted.) I explained the situation to her and she had no idea what I was talking about. No clue that they were no longer putting radar endorsements on a license. She asked me where my application was, and I explained I did not have one because I was not requesting an endorsement, just trying to get on removed from the license. She gave me an application and a payment form, and told me it would be forty five dollars. To say the least her knowledge, attitude, and appearence were all far short of professional.
When I was called back in to meet with an evaluator I was lucky enough to meet with another lady. This lady was very helpful and friendly. I explained to her what I was trying to accomplish. She told me that there was no application needed and that my License was valid, even with the expired radar endorsement, as long it is accompanied by a valid radar recert certificate. I explained to her that this is in contrast to what the people at the NMC had told me. She was nice enought to call the NMC, and came back and said that no new licenses were being issued because of expired radar endorsements and to just keep my certificate with my license. I asked if it was possible to get this writting, as one member on gcaptain said he had done in Boston, but was basically told no. She did tell me that since I already had an open application for raise of grade (Second mate unlimited testing for 1600 ton master) and a MMD renewal that she would send in a copy of my radar certificate to be included with my application just to see what the NMC does with it. Luckily while sorting through my documents, I discovered that my STCW would also be expiring soon (I dont know how this slipped by me but it did). She went on the computer, revised my MMD renewal to include my STCW. She said since I had an open application there would be no no charge. She advised me to call the NMC once I got home.
I called the NMC and spoke with the same lady that had told e I had to take my cert. in the REC. This time she changed her tune and concurred with the REC in that I only need to accompany my license with the valid radar cert and everything is ok.
I guess the day was not a total waste because of the STCW. But nonetheless I spent six hours trying to get things sorted out, and I am still worried about being able to join a vessel holding a license with an expired radar endorsement and nothing in writting from the coast gaurd explaining its ok. I guess I’ll just have to pass the 1600 ton masters test ASAP and get the new license printed so that I’m not in limbo for the next three years.
Anybody else having similiar problems?

For the life of me I can’t understand why this is an issue at all. Carefully read <strong>Section IV - Discussion of Comments and Changes </strong>on the second page of the Final Rule published in the Federal Register on September 11, 2008. Does the Coast Guard not read it’s own final rules?

Maybe I’m wrong, but even in Section IV I did not see anything that explicitly states a license with an expired radar endorsement is still valid when accompanied by a radar refresher certificate. It does make mention of eliminating the “appearence” of an expired license when the endorsement is expired. But all I need is my license to appear expired to a captain, company, union, ect. for a problem to occur.

Common sense would dictate that sailing with the expired RADAR date on the license while holding a new RADAR Refresher Cert is ok IVO the new rule, but that’s not what it sez! The rule makers could have added a sentence or two to that effect, sort of a grandfather clause, and solved all this hand-wringing.

<strong>Revised § 15.815 also requires

mariners to have certificates of training

readily available</strong>. Although the

expiration date will no longer appear on

the license, inspection teams, incident

investigators, employers, and any

appropriate Federal agency

representative must still be able to see

proof that a mariner is currently

qualified as a radar-observer. This

change facilitates enforcement of

qualification requirements while

providing mariners flexibility in the

way they maintain evidence of training.

We made minor editorial changes to

§ 15.815(e), as it was proposed in the

NPRM, t<strong>o clarify that mariners must

carry the original certificate of training</strong>

or a notarized copy thereof onboard, or

provide a copy of the certificate of

training to the requesting entity within

48 hours.

They probably won’t issue you a new license anyhow for the 1600 Master. They’ll print it up on an endorsement page. But then again, maybe they will. You just never know these days…

Why can’t we get all or licenses, endorsements and training certs put on a scanable chip and injected under our skin? Kinda like the lost cat & dog thing…