SWQ Service

For more than two centuries, the U.S. Coast Guard has safeguarded our nation’s maritime interests in the heartland, in the ports, at sea and around the globe. It protects the maritime economy and the environment, defends our maritime borders and saves those in peril. Today’s U.S. Coast Guard, with nearly 42,000 men and women on active duty, is a unique force that carries out an array of civil and military responsibilities, touching almost every facet of the U.S. maritime environment.

The purpose of the Coast Guard Vessel registration Nlets transaction is to provide access to boat registration information via U.S. Coast Guard Vessel Number. Nlets Coast Guard representative Donald Johnson states, “Although the Coast Guard Vessel has MOAs with 25 states and 6 territories, all states bordering a waterway should consider using this valuable resource.”

The Nlets Transaction

Nlets formats the transactions, queries the Coast Guard’s Vessel Identification System (VIS) and returns the result. The “BQ” query transactions will search VIS and return a “BR” response message. The results of the query will vary depending on whether the requesting state has a Memorandum of Agreement (MOA) with the Coast Guard regarding exchange of state vessel data via VIS. If so, the answer will contain any information in VIS, as well as Coast Guard information. If not, the response will contain only data on Coast Guard documented vessels.

The BQ requires the following information:

• Valid, nine-character, sending ORI (Originating Routing Indicator);
• Two-character destination ORI  of “CG;” and,
• Coast Guard or state vessel number or vessel name. (Note: Using Vessel Name may return a large number of results.)

The response (BR) may include any or all of the following data elements:

• Vessel name
• Registration number
• Build year
• Length in feet
• Vessel use
• Hull ID
• Hull type
• Owner name with address, city, state and ZIP

Nlets supports this transaction in legacy text, as well as in XML.

Contact Us

If you are interested in this transaction, please email messagekeys@nlets.org.

Requests from local agencies interested in using the Coast Guard Vessel message key must be reviewed by the Nlets state representative.