The Argentine Hydrographic Service ( official name Servicio de Hidrografia Naval, SHN ) is the branch of the Argentine Navy

Argentine Navy

The Navy of the Argentine Republic or Armada of the Argentine Republic is the navy of Argentina. It is one of the three branches of the Armed Forces of the Argentine Republic, together with the Army and the Air Force....

 responsible for providing hydrographic services.

Background

Created on January 1, 1879 as Oficina Central de Hidrografía (Hydrographic Central Office) by decree 11.289 of President Nicolás Avellaneda

Nicolás Avellaneda

Nicolás Remigio Aurelio Avellaneda Silva was an Argentine politician and journalist, and president of Argentina from 1874 to 1880. Avellaneda's main projects while in office were banking and education reform, leading to Argentina's economic growth...

. It became the current SHN on 1972 by National Law 19.922. In recent years it became administratively part of the Ministry of Defense

Ministry of Defense (Argentina)

The Ministry of Defense of Argentina is a ministry of the national executive power that deals with everything related to the country national defense...

 but operationally still depends on the Navy.

The main mission of the SHN is to provide safe navigation on national waters. The service do so with the creation and maintenance of nautical chart

Nautical chart

A nautical chart is a graphic representation of a maritime area and adjacent coastal regions. Depending on the scale of the chart, it may show depths of water and heights of land , natural features of the seabed, details of the coastline, navigational hazards, locations of natural and man-made aids...

s, coastal marker buoys, and lighthouse

Lighthouse

A lighthouse is a tower, building, or other type of structure designed to emit light from a system of lamps and lenses or, in older times, from a fire, and used as an aid to navigation for maritime pilots at sea or on inland waterways....

s. In concordance to the International Maritime Organization

International Maritime Organization

The International Maritime Organization , formerly known as the Inter-Governmental Maritime Consultative Organization , was established in Geneva in 1948, and came into force ten years later, meeting for the first time in 1959...

 regulations, the SHN is also the global coordinator for the NAVAREA

NAVAREA

NAVAREAS are the geographic areas in which various governments are responsible for navigation and weather warnings.NAVAREAs are mentioned in International Maritime Organization Assembly Resolution A.706 adopted 6 November 1991....

 VI zone, which covers the South West Atlantic ocean region being responsible for emitting alerts to ships at sea and coordinating search and rescue operations.

The national official time

Time in Argentina

Argentina is located at a longitude that would naturally put in the UTC−4 time zone, but it actually uses the UTC−3 time zone. Argentina determines whether to observe daylight saving time on a year-by-year basis, and individual provinces may opt out of the federal decision...

 is also a responsibility of the SHN through the National Naval Observatory.

As of 2010 the following Navy ships are assigned to it :

• ARA Puerto Deseado (Q-20)
  ARA Puerto Deseado (Q-20)
  The ARA Puerto Deseado is an oceanographic survey ship in service in the Argentine Navy. She has a reinforced hull in order to operate in waters around Antarctica.-History:...
  
  
• ARA Comodoro Rivadavia (Q-11)
  ARA Comodoro Rivadavia (Q-11)
  The ARA Comodoro Rivadavia is a survey ship of the Argentine Navy assigned to the national Hydrographic Naval Service which among other things is responsible of the maintenance of nautical charts, balises and lighthouses.-History:Comodoro Rivadavia was built by Mestrina shipyard in Tigre, Buenos...
  
  
• ARA Cormoran (Q-15)
• ARA Petrel (Q-16)