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Pilot services

The NCA is responsible for the state pilot service. The pilot service aims to safeguard traffic at sea and protect the environment by ensuring that vessels operating in Norwegian waters have navigators with adequate qualifications for safe navigation.

Although the pilot today has access to increasingly advanced digital tools, it is still expertise around fairways and coasts, weather conditions and sailing routines that are the main product offered by the pilot and the Norwegian Coastal Administration.

The pilotage service is the simplest and perhaps best preventive maritime safety measure to avoid accidents at sea.

The pilotage service performs about 40,000 assignments a year, from 25 pilot stations located nationwide from Svinesund to Grense Jakobselv.

Compulsory pilotage

The general rule is that all vessels with a length of 70 metres or more are subject to compulsory pilotage when operating in waters within the baselines.

Read more about compulsory pilotage

The pilot fee calculator

The pilotage service is user-financed. Find out how much you have to pay in pilot fees and security fees by using the fee calculator.

Read more about fees here

Book a pilot

Pilot bookings are made electronically in the SafeSeaNet Norway messaging service.

How to book a pilot

Reference routes

Download the Norwegian Coastal Administration's digital sailing routes free of charge at the digital route service routeinfo.no.

Learn more about the digital route service here

Pilot dispatch

Three pilot dispatch centres plan and prioritise pilot assignments, and are the point of contact of shipping.

Around 300 pilots work to make sailing along the coast safe, and ensure operation of the service 24 hours a day - all year round.

Contact

Losdirektør

Erik Freberg Blom /

Pilot service facts

  • Pilots board the vessels at the designated embarkation marks along the coast by means of a pilot boat or helicopter.
  • On board the vessels the pilot acts as an advisor and provides the crew with the necessary knowledge of the fairways to and from Norwegian ports.
  • The pilotage service is available 24 hours a day, all year round.
  • The pilotage service is financed by the fees paid by the shipping trade that utilises the service.
  • The pilotage service also includes the dispatch of pilots, transport services and the pilot exemption certificate scheme.
  • Every year the pilotage service performs around 40,000 assignments nationwide.
  • Pilot operations are carried out by the regional sea traffic offices under the management of pilot masters.
  • Nationwide the Norwegian Coastal Administration has just under 300 active pilots, stationed at 25 pilot stations.
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