World Port Index MCP Server

@pipeworx/world-port-index

Port facilities, depths, anchorages and navigational detail for ~2,950 ports worldwide — lookup by name/UN-LOCODE/WPI number, radius search from a lat/lon point, and listing by country.

Part of Pipeworx — an MCP gateway connecting AI agents to 1808+ live data sources. This is an independent, unofficial integration — not affiliated with, endorsed by, or published by the upstream provider.

Tools

• port_lookup(name | unlocode | wpi_number) — resolve one port and return its WPI number, coordinates, harbor size/type, channel/anchorage/cargo-pier depths, and facility flags (pilotage, tugs, drydock, railway). Refuses with an error if nothing matches; returns a short candidate list if a name matches more than one port.
• ports_near(latitude, longitude, radius_km?, limit?) — ports within a radius of a point, nearest first, with distance in km.
• ports_by_country(country, harbor_size?, limit?) — ports for a country (name or ISO 3166-1 alpha-2 code), optionally filtered by harbor size (V=Very small, S=Small, M=Medium, L=Large).

Auth

Keyless. The pack reads its dataset from a Pipeworx-side store (see "Data sources" below) and makes no outbound calls at request time.

Data sources

• U.S. National Geospatial-Intelligence Agency (NGA), Maritime Safety Information, World Port Index (Pub. 150) — the standard reference for port facilities, depths, and navigational characteristics worldwide. US federal government data; public domain.

This pack does not bake its data into the gateway bundle — a first version did, and a 1.7MB baked table pushed the gateway's JS bundle over its hard size ceiling, blocking every lane's deploy (fleet #3061, 2026-10-14). Instead it reads a single JSON object out of the shared pipeworx-datasets R2 bucket at request time, cached in Worker-isolate memory for several hours so only a cold isolate pays the fetch. scripts/refresh-ports.mjs fetches NGA's live feed, trims it, and writes that object locally; an operator with R2 write access runs the wrangler r2 object put command it prints to publish it (never run by this script itself). If the R2 object isn't published yet, or the binding isn't configured on a deployment, every tool returns a available: false note rather than throwing or going silently empty. Every real response carries data_as_of. Depth fields (channelDepth, anchorageDepth, cargoPierDepth, oilTerminalDepth) are in meters as published by NGA; null means NGA records no data for that category, not zero depth. harborTypeCode and shelterCode are passed through as NGA's own Pub 150 codes rather than decoded, since only the harbor-size code (V/S/M/L) has an unambiguous, well-documented mapping.

Quick Start

Add to your MCP client (Claude Desktop, Cursor, Windsurf, etc.):

{
  "mcpServers": {
    "world-port-index": {
      "url": "https://gateway.pipeworx.io/world-port-index/mcp"
    }
  }
}

What this endpoint actually serves

tools/list at https://gateway.pipeworx.io/world-port-index/mcp returns the tools in the table above plus the shared Pipeworx meta-tools — ask_pipeworx, discover_tools, search_within, remember/recall and the rest of the gateway-wide set. So the tool count you see is larger than this table: a single-pack endpoint currently lists roughly 30 shared tools alongside the pack's own. The connection's initialize response states its exact scope, and is the authoritative answer for a given day.

This is deliberate, not multiplexing by accident. The meta-tools are what let a scoped connection answer a question this pack does not cover — via ask_pipeworx, which routes across the whole catalog — without you adding a second MCP server. There is currently no way to mount a pack endpoint without them; if the extra schemas cost you more context than the routing is worth, connect to the full gateway once rather than to several pack endpoints.

Or connect to the full Pipeworx gateway to get every pack's tools listed directly, instead of just this one's:

{
  "mcpServers": {
    "pipeworx": {
      "url": "https://gateway.pipeworx.io/mcp"
    }
  }
}

Both URLs reach the same gateway and the same 1808+ data sources. The only difference is which pack's tools are listed directly; ask_pipeworx reaches all of them from either one.

No MCP client? Call it over HTTP

curl -X POST https://gateway.pipeworx.io/v1/tools/port_lookup \
  -H 'Content-Type: application/json' \
  -d '{"name":"Rotterdam"}'

No account needed for the first calls. Inspect any tool: GET https://gateway.pipeworx.io/v1/tools/port_lookup. Find one: POST https://gateway.pipeworx.io/v1/tools/search_packs with {"query":"..."}.

Standalone (no gateway account)

This package also runs as a local stdio MCP server — no Pipeworx account, no gateway round-trip:

{
  "mcpServers": {
    "world-port-index": {
      "command": "npx",
      "args": ["-y", "@pipeworx/mcp-world-port-index"]
    }
  }
}

Or run it directly to confirm it starts:

npx -y @pipeworx/mcp-world-port-index

It speaks MCP over stdin/stdout and answers initialize/tools/list/tools/call for only this pack's tools — none of the shared meta-tools the gateway connection above adds. Same source, same tools, no ask_pipeworx routing.

Using with ask_pipeworx

Instead of calling tools directly, you can ask questions in plain English — this works on the pack endpoint above as well as on the full gateway:

ask_pipeworx({ question: "your question about World Port Index data" })

The gateway picks the right tool and fills the arguments automatically.

More

• Docs and guides
• pipeworx.io

License

MIT