Sydney festival to celebrate life on the water • App update advice for Android users

Sydney festival to celebrate life on the water

International Boat Show reshaped as local event while borders remain closed.

The local boating industry is turning over the motors again after COVID-19 scuttled last year’s Sydney International Boat Show.

With the nation’s borders still closed to the world, the show has been remodelled for COVID-safe times as the 2021 Sydney Festival of Boating - and Marine Rescue NSW has the event firmly on our calendar.

The Festival will be held from July 29 to August 1 at the International Convention Centre, with the newest and finest on show on the Cockle Bay marina - including the first 12m Naiad in the MRNSW fleet, Botany Hacking 30.

The event is the initiative of the Boating Industry Association, which is already planning for the return of the Sydney International Boat Show in 2022. MRNSW will be joining our partners, Transport for NSW, the NSW Police Force Marine Area Command and Surf Life Saving NSW in the Festival’s safety zone.

Our volunteers will be on hand to talk all things boating safety with patrons, encouraging boaters to ‘help us help you’ by Logging On and Logging Off with MRNSW whenever they’re on the water, ensuring they always wear lifejackets and making the switch from their older 27MHz marine radio to the newer, safer VHF technology.

MRNSW volunteers will soon be notified on how they can sign on to join the MRNSW contingent.

Talking boating safety ... Cottage Point 30, open to visitors at the 2019 Sydney International Boat Show.

App update advice for Android users

The MarineRescue App continues to grow in popularity with boaters, who appreciate the safety benefits if offers.

Almost 30 per cent of the boaters who Log On to enable our volunteers to track their voyage until their safe return do so using the app.

A number of enhancements and fixes have recently been introduced to improve the app user experience.

Boaters who use the iPhone app are encouraged to update to the latest version, which is now available on the Apple App Store.

Issues replacing the current Android app in the Play Store mean the existing version cannot simply be updated. Instead, a new version has been uploaded to the Play Store.

If you are using the Android version of the app, you need to delete the existing version on your device, download the new version and re-create any profiles you have previously set up.

As Radio Club members’ vessel details are already stored in our database, when they log in to the app using their Marine Rescuesupplied Radio Club call sign and vessel registration, their profiles will automatically re-populate.

In the short term, both the old and new versions of the app will be visible on the Play Store.

Although new users will not be able to download the older version, existing Android users will still be able to use the version already downloaded in their device until they have set up the new version. This will be the case while the old version is still visible on the Play Store.

If you have any questions about this process, please email servicedesk@mrnsw.com.au for tech support.

Marine Rescue at work

Calm before the chop ... the sun sets over glassy waters in Yamba Marina the evening before the Northern Rivers and Mid North Coast SAREX in June. Five MRNSW vessels, including Wooli 30 (above), a NSW Police boat and MRNSW and Surf Life Saving Rescue Water Craft headed out from the staging point soon after dawn the next morning into a sizable swell, successfully locating their search targets.

Test drive ... MR Point Danger’s Courtney Greenslade puts 12m Naiad Botany Hacking 30 through its paces off Port Hacking, ahead of the delivery of the same model superboat to the border unit.

Welcome to Woolgoolga ... Fleet Manager Kelvin Parkin and Regional Operations Manager Randall Gawne with Darryl Hamilton, Shirley Teague, David Forge, Brian Taylor and Mitch Harvey. Flood thanks ... NSW Governor Margaret Beazley meets MR Port Macquarie volunteers Natalie Welsh, Alison Cameron-Brown, Chris Condon and Dave Bigeni, who joined local flood support operations.

Briefed and ready to go ... MR Lemon Tree Passage members Chris Dando, Daryl Jurd, Greg Fletcher and Chris Zammit prepare for the Mid North Coast/Hunter Central Coast SAREX in May.