Maritime Interoperability Demonstration Conducted

The Ship Operations Cooperative Program (SOCP) in partnership with Department of Homeland Security (DHS), Preparedness Directorate, United States Department of Transportation (US DOT), Maritime Administration (MARAD) and an array of other maritime industry organizations conducted a multi-port preparedness identity management (PIM) exercise on July 20, 2006. The “Maritime Interoperability Demonstration (MID)” was an exercise of the First Responder electronic identity/attribute trust model being spearheaded by Tom Lockwood, Director of National Capital Region Coordination (NCRC) within the DHS Preparedness Directorate. MID was conducted simultaneously at four major eastern seaboard public/private ports to include Port of Baltimore, Md; Port of Norfolk, Va; JAXPORT in Jacksonville, Fla; and Crowley Shipping in Jacksonville, Fla. This exercise simulated a communication-out emergency response environment. Portable handheld readers integrated with light-weight satellite communications (SATCOM) units transmitted and exchanged data between ports. Within ten minutes of the final card reading, all ports had total visibility of all participants and their access status to include time in/out and access location. The SATCOM units transmitted to multiple locations simultaneously via broadband global area network (BGAN). This was the first of a series of exercises to be conducted throughout the remainder of this year. The next steps are to increase the complexity and include electronic identity management as a performance measure in all future exercises.