
                         Roanoke Times
                 Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.

DATE: SUNDAY, April 2, 1995                   TAG: 9504040045
SECTION: VIRGINIA                    PAGE: C-3   EDITION: METRO 
SOURCE: Associated Press
DATELINE: NORFOLK                                LENGTH: Short

COAST GUARD TUNES OUT MORSE CODE

The Coast Guard, after nearly a century of monitoring telegraph distress calls that included the Titanic's tragic 1912 collision with an iceberg, turned off its Morse code equipment Friday.

The reason: ``Modern technology,'' said Jim Wren, a Coast Guard master chief who has been a radioman for 23 1/2 years. ``We've just found more rapid and secure ways of communicating.''

But the new methods that use satellites and automatic navigation beacons to track mayday calls at sea don't have the personal touch of the keyed ``dots'' and ``dashes'' that the Coast Guard has sent and received since the early 1900s, veteran radiomen said.

``It's the human touch,'' said Petty Officer Tony Turner, a radioman at the Coast Guard's Atlantic Communications Station in Chesapeake. ``It's coming from a person's hand, through the air, into another man's ear - and there's no language barrier.''

``It's a sad moment,'' Wren said.

Local radio operators gathered at the Chesapeake station to ``sit around and talk old times,'' as Wren said, and to bid farewell to the familiar clicks and clacks that carried news about ocean storms, ship arrivals and departures and sea emergencies.

``I think it's the right thing to do, but I understand the nostalgia,'' said Cmdr. Fred Montoya, commander of the Chesapeake center. ``It's something these guys are brought up with, something they believe is the best.''

by CNB