@pipeworx/vessel-tracking

Live worldwide ship positions from AIS radio broadcasts. Platform key (aisstream.io), BYO accepted.

Part of Pipeworx — an MCP gateway connecting AI agents to 1394+ live data sources.

Tools

• live_ships_in_area(...) — vessels broadcasting right now in a bounding box or around a point, with position, speed, course, navigational status, type, destination and IMO, plus a breakdown by vessel type.
• live_ship_position(...) — live position for specific vessels by MMSI.
• ais_coverage_check(...) — whether any receiver actually covers a location, so a zero can be read correctly.

Auth

Platform key (PLATFORM_AISSTREAM_KEY), or BYO via _apiKey. Free, instant signup at https://aisstream.io.

Coverage — read this before trusting a zero

aisstream is a community network of terrestrial receivers, so coverage follows where volunteers run hardware. Verified 2026-07-27 with a 60-second subscription:

There is no coverage of the Gulf or Red Sea. Satellite AIS — the paid product from Spire/ORBCOMM — is what covers open ocean and unreceivered coasts, and this is not that. Asking about Hormuz returns coverage: "none" with a redirect to chokepoint_status, never a bare 0.

The count field is named vessels_observed, not vessel_count, because it measures what was heard in a listening window rather than what is present. Every zero carries a coverage verdict of confirmed, none or unconfirmed.

Sampling caveat

AIS transmit intervals depend on motion: a vessel underway broadcasts every 2-10 seconds, one at anchor roughly every 3 minutes. Short windows therefore under-count stationary ships. live_ship_position is best effort by nature — a 35s window found 1 of 8 vessels confirmed transmitting moments earlier — so widen window_seconds (max 40; beyond that callers time out) or use vesselfinder_vessel for a stored last-known position.

Data sources

• Stream: wss://stream.aisstream.io/v0/stream

Quick Start

Add to your MCP client (Claude Desktop, Cursor, Windsurf, etc.):

{
  "mcpServers": {
    "vessel-tracking": {
      "url": "https://gateway.pipeworx.io/vessel-tracking/mcp"
    }
  }
}

Or connect to the full Pipeworx gateway for access to all 1394+ data sources:

{
  "mcpServers": {
    "pipeworx": {
      "url": "https://gateway.pipeworx.io/mcp"
    }
  }
}

Using with ask_pipeworx

Instead of calling tools directly, you can ask questions in plain English:

ask_pipeworx({ question: "your question about Vessel Tracking data" })

The gateway picks the right tool and fills the arguments automatically.

More

• Docs and guides
• pipeworx.io

License

MIT