MARITIME

COMMUNICATIONS
(MARCOM)

C/M Ricardo O. Ladines

Instructor
MORSE CODE
MORSE CODE TELEGRAPH
 INTERNATIONAL MORSE CODE
• Morse code is named after Samuel Morse, one of the inventors of the telegraph. The
Morse alphabet became a worldwide standard in 1865. It has been widely used in the
maritime world until the end of the 20th century.

• The Morse alphabet is designed so that the most frequent letters in the English alphabet
has the shortest codes. This makes transmission much faster than if all letters would
have equal length codes.

• The International Morse Code includes the English letters, some extra Latin letters, the
Arabic numerals and a small set of punctuation and procedural signals.

• Letters are separated by a space of duration equal to three dots. Words are separated by
a space equal to seven dots.

• There are also special Morse alphabets for other languages than English.

• Morse code is usually transmitted by on-off keying of an information-carrying medium

such as electric current, radio waves, visible light, or sound waves. The current or wave
is present during the time period of the dot or dash and absent during the time between
dots and dashes
• In an emergency, Morse code can be generated by improvised methods such
as turning a light on and off, tapping on an object or sounding a horn or
whistle, making it one of the simplest and most versatile methods of
telecommunication. The most common distress signal is SOS – three dots,
three dashes, and three dots – internationally recognized by treaty.

INTERNATIONAL MORSE CODE IS COMPOSED OF FIVE

ELEMENTS:
(Representation, timing, and speeds)

• short mark, dot or "dit" (▄▄▄▄): "dot duration" is one time unit long
• longer mark, dash or "dah" (▄▄▄▄▄▄): three time units long
• inter-element gap between the dots and dashes within a character: one dot
duration or one unit long
• short gap (between letters): three time units long
• medium gap (between words): seven time units long
 TRANSMISSION
• Morse code can be transmitted in a number of ways: originally as electrical
pulses along a telegraph wire, but also as an audio tone, a radio signal with
short and long tones, or as a mechanical, audible, or visual signal (e.g. a
flashing light) using devices like an Aldis lamp or a heliograph, a common
flashlight, or even a car horn. Some mine rescues have used pulling on a rope -
a short pull for a dot and a long pull for a dash.

• Morse code is transmitted using just two states (on and off). Historians have
called it the first digital code. Morse code may be represented as a binary code,
and that is what telegraph operators do when transmitting messages. Working
from the above ITU definition and further defining a bit as a dot time, a Morse
code sequence may be made from a combination of the following five
bit-strings:
REPRESENTATION, TIMING, AND SPEEDS
International Morse code is composed of five elements
• short mark, dot or "dit" (▄▄▄▄): 1
• longer mark, dash or "dah" (▄▄▄▄▄▄): 111
• intra-character gap (between the dots and dashes within a character): 0
• short gap (between letters): 000
• medium gap (between words): 0000000
• Note that the marks and gaps alternate: dots and dashes are
always separated by one of the gaps, and that the gaps are
always separated by a dot or a dash.

• Morse messages are generally transmitted by a hand-operated

device such as a telegraph key, so there are variations
introduced by the skill of the sender and receiver — more
experienced operators can send and receive at faster speeds. In
addition, individual operators differ slightly, for example,
using slightly longer or shorter dashes or gaps, perhaps only
for particular characters. This is called their "fist", and
experienced operators can recognize specific individuals by it
alone. A good operator who sends clearly and is easy to copy
is said to have a "good fist". A "poor fist" is a characteristic of
sloppy or hard to copy Morse code.
 • NOTE!!!

• ( To be used for all general public service radio communication.

1. A dash is equal to three dots;

2. The space between parts of the same letter is equal to one dot

3. The space between two letters is equal to three dots

4. The space between two words is equal to seven dots

PLEASE WATCH AND FAMILIARIZED THE FOLLOWING

MORSE CODE..
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=L-wapuOpD0I
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Morse_code#Aviation
INTERNATIONAL
MORSE CODE
A • —
B — • • •
C — • — •
D — • •
E •
F • • — •
G — —•
H • • • •
I • •
J • — — —
K — • —
L • — ••
M — •
N — •
O — — —
P • — — •
Q — —•—
R •—•
S • • •
T —
U • • —
V • • • —
W • — —
X — • • —
Y — • — —
Z ——••
Video Link::
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=y3GpC7y4n94

1 • ————
2 • • — — —
3 • • • — —
4 • • • • —
5 • • • • •
6 — • • • •
7 — —• • •
8 — — — • •
9 — —— —•
0 — — ——
 Period (full stop) •—•—•—
Comma — — •• — —
Colon — — — •••
Interrogation (Also used for “please repeat
after …”when interrupting long messages •• — — ••
(IMI)
Apostrophe •— — — —•
Hyphen or dash — ••••—
Solidus (fraction bar or division sign (NR) —••— •
Parentheses:
Left hand bracket “(“ —•——•
Right hand bracket “)” —•——•—
Inverted commas •—••— •
Double dash (Break) (BT) —•••—
Distress call (SOS)
••• — — — •••
https://youtu.be/9A3tBINRdiE
Attention call to precede every
—•—•—
transmission (CT)
• INTERNATIONAL MORSE
CODE
• (PUNCTUATION)

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rv_gfxG0UgI
 General Enquiry call (CQ) —•— • — — •—
From (DE) — •• •
Invitation to transmit (go ahead) (K) —•—
Wait (AS) •—•••
Understood (VE) ••• — •
Error ••••••••
Received (OK) (R) •—•
Position report (to precede all position
— •—•
messages) (TR)
End of message; also cross or addition
•—•—•
sign (AR)
Transmission finished (end of work)
•••—•—
(Conclusion of correspondence) (VA)
 SPOKEN REPRESENTATION
Morse code is often spoken or written with "dah" for dashes, "dit" for dots
located at the end of a character, and "di" for dots located at the beginning or
internally within the character. Thus, the following Morse code sequence:

M O R S E C O D E
−− −−− ·−· ··· · (space) −·−· −−− −

is orally:

Dah-dah dah-dah-dah di-dah-dit di-di-dit dit, Dah-di-dah-dit dah-dah-dah

dah-di-dit dit.

There is little point in learning to read written Morse as above; rather, the
sounds of all of the letters and symbols need to be learned, for both sending
and receiving.
• LINK FOR MORSE CODE

• https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Morse_code#:~:text=The%20Int
ernational%20Morse%20Code%20encodes,sequence%20of%2
0dots%20and%20dashes.
 SPEED IN WORDS PER MINUTE
• All Morse code elements depend on the dot length. A dash is the
length of 3 dots, and spacings are specified in number of dot
lengths. An unambiguous method of specifying the transmission
speed is to specify the dot duration as, for example, 50
milliseconds.
• Some method to standardize the transformation of a word rate to a
dot duration is useful. A simple way to do this is to choose a dot
duration that would send a typical word the desired number of times
in one minute. If, for example, the operator wanted a character
speed of 13 words per minute, the operator would choose a dot rate
that would send the typical word 13 times in exactly one minute.
• Because Morse code is usually sent by hand, it is unlikely that an
operator could be that precise with the dot length, and the individual
characteristics and preferences of the operators usually override the
standards.
• A difference between amateur radio licenses and commercial radiotelegraph
licenses is that commercial operators must be able to receive code groups of
random characters along with plain language text. For each class of license,
the code group speed requirement is slower than the plain language text
requirement. For example, for the Radiotelegraph Operator License, the
examinee must pass a 20 word per minute plain text test and a 16 word per
minute code group test.

• Based upon a 50 dot duration standard word such as PARIS, the time for
one dot duration or one unit can be computed by the formula:

• T = 1200 / W
Where: T is the unit time, or dot duration in milliseconds, and W is the speed
in wpm.
• High-speed telegraphy contests are held; according to the Guinness Book of
Records in June 2005 at the International Amateur Radio Union's 6th World
Championship in High Speed Telegraphy in Primorsko, Bulgaria, Andrei
Bindasov of Belarus transmitted 230 morse code marks of mixed text in one
minute.
END…