How to access Spire Maritime Vessel Characteristics data in maritime 2.0 graphQL API
Vessel Characteristics (VC) is a recognised term for detailed technical data about vessels (ships) used by many information providers including Spire. Previously in Spire Vessels API this was referred to as Extended Vessel Data (EVD) but going forward and in Maritime 2.0 graphQL API we are using Vessel Characteristics as the feature name.
VC (or EVD) as provided in Vessels API is documented here but is more extensive in Maritime 2.0 and any users of EVD data in Vessels API should migrate to using VC data in Maritime 2.0.
The official API documentation for Vessel Characteristics is found here but we elaborate on the actual data and it's values below.
Overview
Vessel Characteristics (VC) data is a set of additional data that provides further information for over 90K commercial vessels within the Maritime 2.0 API. This information is available for vessels that have an IMO number. Vessels with IMO numbers are generally sea-going merchant ships of 100 gross tons (GT) and above. The fields of information available for each ship will vary depending on it's type, size and life cycle stage. For instance a Bulker carrier may have a cubic grain capacity but not a container capacity which a container ship will have but a neither container ship or a bulk carrier will have a cubic metre tank capacity that tankers have.
This information relates to the following categories:
- Capacity
- Design
- Dimensions
- History
- Propulsions
- Registration
- Vessel and Trading Type
Vessel Characteristics data is updated on a regular basis from multiple partners who specialise in researching and providing the data to Spire.
Vessel Characteristics data is available within two graphQL object fields VesselCharacteristicsBasic and VesselCharacteristicsExtended.
VesselCharacteristicsBasic
VesselCharacteristicsBasic is available to all users of Maritime 2.0. This provides 7 fields of key information that should be useful to all users to identify the size, type and age of a vessel.
graphQL Vessels objects contains the following objects as part of the VesselsCharacteristicsBasic type.
vesselSubtype: String
}
Example graphQL query requesting VesselCharacteristicsBasic
query chars {
vessels( first:100 shipType:[CONTAINER,TANKER_CRUDE,LNG_CARRIER,DRY_BULK]
) {
pageInfo { hasNextPage endCursor } totalCount { value relation }
nodes { id
staticData { imo mmsi aisClass flag name
callsign timestamp updateTimestamp shipType shipSubType
mmsi callsign dimensions {a b c d width length }
}
lastPositionUpdate { accuracy collectionType course heading
latitude longitude maneuver navigationalStatus rot speed timestamp updateTimestamp
}
currentVoyage { destination draught eta timestamp updateTimestamp }
characteristics {
basic {
capacity {
deadweight
netTonnage
}
history {
builtYear
}
vesselTypeAndTrading {
# vesselType
vesselSubtype
}
}
}
}
}
}
and
VesselCharacteristicsExtended which is a premium feature available as a paid for extra.
Default and Extended.
- Default EVD fields are available within both the Standard and Premium Vessels APIs.
- Extended EVD Fields are available within the Premium Vessels API.