The box was smaller than Percy Dalgleish expected.

“I thought it would be bigger,” the fisherman said, standing on the deck of his trawler Northern Light at Harbourfront boatyard on Monday morning, watching Reg Compton unpack a grey metal unit roughly the size of a biscuit tin. “For nineteen thousand eight hundred florins across the fleet, I expected something with a dial on it, at least.”

The unit is manufactured by Ashwater Signal Works, selected by the Council Maritime Affairs Committee in its 5-2 vote on 19 March. It weighs four pounds. It transmits a vessel’s position via radio pulse at twelve-minute intervals to the Port Authority’s receiving station. It has no dial. It has one switch, one indicator lamp, and a five-year warranty.

Compton, the Harbourfront boatwright who offered to perform installations at cost, fitted the unit to the Northern Light’s wheelhouse roof in just over two hours. He was assisted by his nephew, Tom Compton, a twenty-three-year-old apprentice boatwright who has been learning the trade at the yard for three years.

“It’s a morning’s work per boat if you know what you’re about,” Compton said, repeating the estimate he gave the Maritime Affairs Committee. “The aerial mount wants a solid backing plate. The wiring runs to the battery bank. The rest is bracket work.”

Dalgleish watched the entire installation from the wheelhouse door. He is forty-four years old, has fished these waters for twenty-one years, and was among the most vocal advocates at the Harbour Authority Board meeting that led to the beacon mandate. He lost no vessel, but he remembers the eighteen hours when Captain Dermot Shale’s Lady Maren was missing in March, and the weight of not knowing.

“The beacon won’t keep the weather off,” he said. “But if something goes wrong, someone will know where to start looking. That’s all any of us ever asked for.”

Ashwater Signal Works delivered the first batch of fifteen units to Harbourfront boatyard on Saturday. The programme will run approximately six weeks, with Compton and his nephew working through the fleet in order of vessel size — larger trawlers first, smaller craft afterwards. The twelve-florin annual maintenance levy will be invoiced beginning in January 2027.

Alderman Jessamine Cole, who chairs the Maritime Affairs Committee, visited the boatyard briefly on Monday afternoon. She inspected the fitted unit, asked two questions about waterproofing, received satisfactory answers, and departed.

The Northern Light put to sea on the afternoon tide. The indicator lamp was lit.