To keep track of your boat, whether it’s at the dock, on the trailer in your driveway, or headed to cruising grounds beyond the horizon, a remote position monitoring system is an up and coming utility that deserves a little attention. While the core technology here has been available in the auto industry for several years, it’s just beginning to take hold in recreational boating.

In terrestrial lingo, it’s “Onstar” for your boat. And among the half-dozen or so products in the marine market, SeaKey is one of the standouts, in terms of dedicated resources and the range of features the system provides. “Our system has three things to offer the boater,” says Jeff Fellows, director of product development for the Bethesda, Maryland-based company. “We provide safety, security and what we call entertainment and enjoyment.”
Safety comes in the form of constant position monitoring via the company’s website, and an integral SOS alert system activated from the helm. Security is provided by SeaKey’s GeoFence, which raises an alert when the boat moves from its assigned location, like when it is stolen. Entertainment and enjoyment refers to the extensive concierge service that can provide on-the-water information on land-based services, whether you need a repair facility at your destination port, or the name of a good Thai restaurant when you arrive.

The heart of the system is the Orbcomm satellite constellation, 30-some satellites orbiting at 481 miles above the earth. Unlike its competitors, Iridium and Globalstar, which are heavily devoted to telecommunications, Orbcomm is designed for two-way, machine-to-machine links, the likes of which find widespread use in commercial shipping and transport for companies to keep track of their goods.

This dedication to position monitoring makes the system extremely reliable. While Orbcomm accommodates a rudimentary level of text messaging, it wasn’t built for conversations or e-mail at the helm. But if all you need to do is send a message, “Go buy chicken” on your way home from a dolphin fishing trip, it’ll do the job.

SeaKey monitors boat location with GPS and communicates that location via its integral cell phone channel or satellite communications channel to a 24-hour call center in North Carolina where thirty-five operators are standing by, 24/7/365 to make sure the essential information reaches you.

When the boat—and the SeaKey transmitter—is within cell phone coverage, it utilizes that channel for communicating information. When out of cell range, it defaults to satellite communication, so coverage is almost worldwide. There are a few places where coverage lapses, but unless you plan to travel beneath the Horn of Africa, or in the Pacific off Australia, the point is moot. Suffice it to say the coverage is far in excess of anything most skippers will likely require.

Sea Key will call a list of numbers you specify, and they will keep trying until they reach you. “We find it usually takes us three phone calls to contact the owner,” said Fellows. In addition to position information, the system is set up to provide basic state-of-the craft data, such as battery levels and water in the bilge. This function is especially useful if you leave your boat in the water. It will alert you if the bilge pumps aren’t working when they better be, or let you know your electrical system is not amped, and may need to be checked on before a trip offshore.
One of the company’s many success stories involves a skipper who was contacted by the call center on his cell phone to tell him his boat was taking on water and his bilge pump was not working. He received the call while he was at the helm, out on the water.

It makes you wonder if he should set the GeoFence to alert him in case his boat gets stolen while he’s fishing from it.

More practically, the GeoFence feature has some valuable applications, whether your boat stays in the water or lives on a trailer. GeoFence allows the programming of particular GPS coordinates of where your boat should be located. If it moves outside of the fence coordinates, the alarm is raised. So when you’re anchored out and the boat slips its mooring, when rats chew through your dock lines in the night; or when hoodlums throw a chain around the trailer tongue and try to drag her off when you’re at work, somebody in North Carolina is going to know it immediately, and so will you as soon as you answer the phone.

So effective is the “Lo-Jack” feature that you can expect a discount on your insurance, from better companies, when you install SeaKey. Another feature related to the GeoFence function is the ability to log a travel plan, with waypoints set for where you plan to be. Anyone with access to your Web site, for which you provide the password and access permission, can then track your travels.

If you are supposed to tie up in Mackinac by mid-afternoon, whoever is watching your progress will know whether you have arrived or not, and they’ll know your last reported location. It’s a handy safety and security feature, whether your long trips take you to the northern reaches of Georgian Bay or the Out Islands of the Bahamas.
You can also keep track of your boat when you are not aboard. Ever get talked into letting one of your responsible teenage children take your boat out by themselves? This handy feature lets you know exactly where they are taking it. Or did you fall for that “I won’t go more than three miles from shore!” line? With this tracking feature you’ll know if that three miles extends across the Gulf Stream or means three miles off Key West.

Practically speaking, SeaKey is a couple of little boxes you mount in your boat, one with a 4-inch diagonal display at the helm, and another “black box” that stows below decks. And no, you can’t use any of the other black boxes that are down there. You need a special one to make SeaKey work.

You’ll need to mount a couple of antennas to make this gadget work. Since any boat with any level of electronic sophistication already has a certain amount of top-hamper acreage set aside for antennas, this is likely easy to accommodate. You’ll need a low profile GPS antenna that comes with the hardware kit, and you have your choice of a 4- or 5 1/2-foot whip, to tie into the satellite constellation. The longer antenna boosts performance, and is packaged as the “Bluewater” option by SeaKey.

The basic SeaKey hardware is available at a street price of about $2,000 and the choice of antenna is the only option. The shorter antenna runs about $150, and is included in the base price. The longer option makes an additional $350 dent in your wallet. The high-end option also provides the best, most reliable coverage, and is recommended for extensive offshore travel. It boosts both performance and range over the shorter antenna.
Once installed, you need a subscription to the monitoring service for the equipment to do its job. Service plans, once the various components are installed, run $29.95 a month. And that is unlimited use of everything, including the concierge service. Seasonal plans run slightly higher—up to $35 a month, and you only pay for the months you want the system active. For more information: Sea Key, (866) 4-SEAKEY, www.seakeyna.com.