South Carolina, Georgia, Florida, Alabama, Mississippi, Louisiana, and Texas, as well as US waters around Puerto Rico and the US Virgin Islands. Fisheries monitored by VMS Rock shrimp endorsement holders (trawl) Highly migratory species, or HMS (pelagic longline) Shark (gillnet and bottom longline gear) Penalty fleet (vessels subject to VMS monitoring as a penalty for violating fisheries regulations) Reef fish 269 vessels monitored by VMS Skymate VMS is not approved for reef fish. Northwest The Northwest Region includes marine waters off U.S. states of Washington, Oregon and California. Rockfish Conservation Areas (RCAs): large-scale depth-based areas for stock preservation Cowcod Conservation Areas (CCAs): areas of previous overfishing Yelloweye Rockfish Conservation Area (YRCA): for another overfished species The Pacific Coast vessel monitoring program consists of declaration reports and a vessel monitoring system. The declaration reports must be filed leaving port, and must identify: the vessel operator's intent to fish within an RCA, the gear type will be used for fishing, the fishery they are participating in. Declaration reports are only necessary for fisheries that are allowed within a closed area and before a vessel intends to fish. Southwest Salmon-related issues remain the priority. Alaska Argos CLS is approved in this region. Pacific Islands Argos and Inmarsat-C are approved. The Pacific Islands Region includes waters around U.S. islands of Hawaii, Guam, Northern Mariana Islands, American Samoa, Wake Island, Midway Island, Howland and Baker Islands, Kingman Reef and Palmyra Atoll, Johnston Island and Jarvis Island. Approximately 200 vessels have VMS. Pelagic longline Northwestern Hawaiian Islands lobster trap American Samoa alia (small vessel longline, pilot project) Tuna purse seine (operating under South Pacific Tuna Treaty) Krill trawl (operating under CCAMLR) Foreign longline, pole and line (operating according to terms of court-ordered settlement agreements resulting from violations of US fishery law) The Vessel Monitoring System used by the Pacific Islands Forum Fisheries Agency (FFA) is provided by Trackwell. Highly migratory species in multiple regions The VMS for HMS consists of both the mobile transceiver unit placed on the vessel and the communications service provider that supplies the wireless link between the unit on the vessel and the shoreside data user. In the HMS Fisheries, the vessel owner is required to procure both VMS components. The two VMS components may, or may not, be provided by a single vendor. Thus, the vessel owner may need to procure the mobile transceiver unit and the mobile communications service separately.