Heisenberg Shipping, a Turkish ship agency, has launched two publicly accessible live traffic dashboards for the Istanbul Strait (Bosphorus) and the Çanakkale Strait (Dardanelles). Both pages are open to any visitor, require no registration, and are maintained by the company's Istanbul operations team and Çanakkale office.

The two dashboards are available at heisenbergshipping.com/live-bosphorus-strait-traffic-status/ and heisenbergshipping.com/live-dardanelles-canakkale-strait-traffic-status/.

What the dashboards show

Each dashboard presents the current day's transit picture for one strait in a single view. A pair of horizontal timeline bars covers a full 24-hour period in Istanbul local time — one bar for northbound traffic, one for southbound. Green segments mark open windows when traffic is flowing in that direction, red segments mark active or scheduled suspensions, and grey segments mark periods not yet planned. A vertical marker labelled NOW shows the present moment against the schedule, so a viewer can see at a glance whether the strait is open in their direction and when the next change is expected.

Above each timeline, a status panel summarises live vessel activity in both directions: how many vessels are currently in transit, how many are scheduled for passage, and how many are ready and waiting at the anchorages. The dashboards also display current conditions, visibility, average waiting time by direction, and the time of the last update.

Why traffic visibility matters in the Turkish Straits

The Turkish Straits are the only maritime route between the Black Sea and the Mediterranean, and traffic density there is high enough that schedule changes translate directly into cost. In 2025, the Istanbul Strait recorded 40,172 vessel transits and the Çanakkale Strait recorded 44,468, figures broadly consistent with the two-decade pattern in which combined annual movements have ranged between roughly 80,000 and 100,000 transits.

Transit sequencing in both straits is managed by the Turkish Straits Vessel Traffic Service (TSVTS), operated by the General Directorate of Coastal Safety. Suspensions are issued for large-vessel transits, weather, poor visibility and scheduled events, and they can be announced or lifted within hours. For a shipowner, charterer or operator, an unexpected suspension at either entrance can add days of waiting time and materially change demurrage exposure on a voyage.

The regulatory framework itself continues to change. A revised Turkish Straits Vessel Traffic Regulation Implementation Directive, approved under Ministerial Decree No. 306827 dated 1 October 2025, entered into force on 13 October 2025 and replaced the 2018 directive. Among other changes, it permits container vessels of 300 metres and over to transit the Çanakkale Strait at night, requires passenger and container vessels of 300 metres and over to notify authorities of ETA changes at least six hours in advance, and updates pilotage and tug escort planning provisions for Çanakkale.

Relationship to the company's transit agency service

The dashboards sit alongside Heisenberg Shipping's Turkish Straits Transit Agency service at heisenbergshipping.com/turkish-straits-transit-agency/, which covers northbound and southbound passage for dry bulk vessels, tankers and supporting ships up to 300 metres LOA. That service includes pre-arrival information and transit coordination, anchorage area services, spare parts delivery, Cash to Master (CTM) delivery, bunkering agency, and crew change and husbandry arrangements at either strait. The company assisted 174 vessels with strait transit agency service in 2025.

The transit agency page also carries long-term passage statistics for both straits from 2006 to 2025, entrance coordinates for the Bosphorus and Dardanelles, a real-time wind map for Istanbul and Çanakkale, current bunker sulphur requirements for transit and port operations, and archived notices including the Turkish authorities' P&I confirmation letter requirements and the October 2025 directive revision.

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"The schedule tells you what is planned; it does not tell you why a suspension was issued or where a vessel sits in the sequence within an open window," Heisenberg Shipping's Istanbul operations team said. "These pages were built because that first layer of information should not be difficult to find. Anyone planning a passage can now see the state of both straits without making a call. When the question goes beyond the schedule, the transit desk is in continuous communication with TSVTS and can explain the operational picture behind it."

Data sources and limitations

The dashboards are published for general information and reference. They are not intended for navigational, operational or critical decision-making use. Vessel movements, SP1 and SP2 timings, current speeds, visibility ranges and opening schedules are subject to sudden change on the basis of operational requirements, weather, and directives from the port authorities. Heisenberg Shipping advises all users to consult official notices from the General Directorate of Coastal Safety (KEGM), local port authorities and certified navigational charts before any critical operation. The full disclaimer is published on each dashboard page.

About Heisenberg Shipping

Heisenberg Shipping is a Turkish ship agency providing full ship agency, protective agency, crew agency, husbandry and shipyard agency services at Turkish ports including Istanbul, Çanakkale, Mersin, İzmir, Aliağa, Antalya and İskenderun, together with transit agency services through the Bosphorus and Dardanelles and shipyard agency coverage at Tuzla and Yalova. The company also publishes an online laytime calculator and maritime research material for commercial operators.

Media Contact

Heisenberg Shipping Istanbul Operations Team — Turkish Straits (Bosphorus and Dardanelles)
Email: [email protected]
Website: https://heisenbergshipping.com
X (Twitter): @HeisenbergShip