IMSO Signs LRIT Services Agreements with Pole Star for the LRIT Data Centres of Algeria, Bolivia, Egypt, and Montenegro

December 2, 2009 at 9:49 am | Posted in Space Law | Leave a comment

by P.J. Blount with the blog faculty

From the IMSO:

IMSO NEWS 026
25 November 2009

IMSO SIGNS LRIT SERVICES AGREEMENTS WITH POLE STAR FOR THE LRIT DATA CENTRES OF ALGERIA, BOLIVIA, EGYPT, AND MONTENEGRO

The IMSO Director General, Captain Esteban Pacha, today signed four more LRIT Services Agreements between IMSO and Pole Star Space Applications Limited on behalf of the following four National LRIT Data Centres which have delegated authority to Pole Star: Algeria, Bolivia Egypt and Montenegro.

A total of 30 LRIT Services Agreements have now been signed between IMSO and LRIT Data Centres operators.

The LRIT Services Agreement, prescribed in the IMSO Convention, establishes the relationship between IMSO, as the LRIT Coordinator appointed by IMO, and the LRIT Data Centre for the audit and review of each Data Centre. A Model LRIT Services Agreement was approved for this purpose by the IMSO Assembly at its Twentieth Session on Malta in 2008.

The IMSO LRIT Audit Procedures also provide that the LRIT Data Centre Operator should sign a LRIT Services Agreement/Contractual Arrangements with IMSO before the Audit takes place, and settle its financial obligations with IMSO before the final audit report is submitted to the IMO Maritime Safety Committee.

Captain Pacha expressed his satisfaction with the continued progress on the implementation of the LRIT system worldwide.

Six LRIT Data Centres were integrated into the original LRIT production environment at the end of 2008, and a further thirty three LRIT Data Centres have been integrated into the LRIT system by IMSO in 2009. In addition ten more Data Centres are currently conducting developmental testing and are expected to be integrated shortly.

This will bring the total number of LRIT Data Centres integrated by the end of 2009 to forty nine overall, integrating more than 85 percent of the world’s registered merchant fleet.