Navtex OnlineNAVTEX in the Caribbean
Four NAVTEX stations reach the Caribbean: San Juan in Puerto Rico (US Coast Guard), Curaçao, Santa Marta on Colombia's Caribbean coast, and Miami for the Florida Straits and the Bahamas.
San Juan, Curaçao and Miami broadcast in English on 518 kHz. Santa Marta has an English service on 518 kHz and a Spanish one on 490 kHz.
Stations and broadcast times (UTC)
| Station | Letter | Frequency | Language | Range | Broadcast times (UTC) |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| San Juan | R | 518 kHz | English | 200 nm | 02:50, 06:50, 10:50, 14:50, 18:50, 22:50 |
| Curaçao | H | 518 kHz | English | 400 nm | 01:10, 05:10, 09:10, 13:10, 17:10, 21:10 |
| Santa Marta | C | 518 kHz | English | 400 nm | 00:20, 04:20, 08:20, 12:20, 16:20, 20:20 |
| Santa Marta | K | 490 kHz | Spanish | 400 nm | 01:40, 05:40, 09:40, 13:40, 17:40, 21:40 |
| Miami | A | 518 kHz | English | 240 nm | 00:00, 04:00, 08:00, 12:00, 16:00, 20:00 |
Each slot is a 10-minute window, repeated every 4 hours. Urgent messages can go out at any time. Range is the designed range in nautical miles.
Which station for which waters
- Puerto Rico, the Virgin Islands and the Mona Passage: San Juan.
- Aruba, Bonaire, Curaçao and the coast of Venezuela: Curaçao.
- Colombia's Caribbean coast, Cartagena and the south-western Caribbean: Santa Marta.
- Florida Straits, the Bahamas and the north coast of Cuba: Miami.
Most of the Lesser Antilles, east and south of the Virgin Islands, are outside these stations' designed range.
Latest messages from these stations
No messages received recently.
Few or no messages from San Juan R, Curaçao H, Santa Marta C and Miami A have reached us in the last week, so their pages may be empty.
What the messages contain
- Navigational warnings (subject
A): military exercises and firing practice, unlit or missing buoys and lights, wrecks, underwater work, cable laying, search areas. - Meteorological warnings (
B): gale and storm warnings. - Weather forecasts (
E). - Search and rescue (
D): distress relays and requests to keep a lookout.
Every message starts with ZCZC, the station letter, the subject letter and a serial number, and ends with NNNN. How to read a NAVTEX message
Reading the messages online
Navtex Online shows the messages received from these stations, each with the original text and a readable version with the abbreviations written out. They come from receivers that publish what they hear and from official lists of warnings; see data sources.
Official sources for this region:
Not for navigation. Reception on land can be incomplete or garbled, and a message can be missing. This site does not replace a NAVTEX receiver on board or the official broadcasts.
Questions
What frequency is NAVTEX in the Caribbean?
518 kHz: San Juan R, Curaçao H, Santa Marta C and Miami A (English). 490 kHz: Santa Marta K (Spanish). Most receivers can listen to 518 kHz and 490 kHz at the same time.
When are the weather forecasts sent?
Weather forecasts (subject E) go out at least twice a day, in each station's own time slots in the table above. The latest forecasts received are on each station's page.
Can I read these messages without a receiver?
Ashore, yes: the messages received from these stations are on this page and on each station's page, for planning. At sea, carry a NAVTEX receiver: internet access is not reliable offshore, and an online copy can be late or incomplete.
More: NAVAREA IV (West Atlantic) · Other regions · What is NAVTEX · Station map