The Associated Press had a good article today on difficulties encountered by harbor pilots in navigating ocean vessels. Each ship has its own electronic navigation gear and unfortunately, little of it is standardized. This forces the ships pilots to understand the symbology and mechanics of dozens of divergent navigation systems instead of having expert knowledge of a standard set.
Differences in systems architecture and symbology were contributing factors in the ship/bridge collision and subsequent oil spill of the COSCO Busan in San Francisco Bay on November 7th, 2007.
What is interesting is that the article, which is clipped below, mentions that it would be difficult to get shipbuilders and shipping lines to standardize on a base set of functions that all harbor pilots can use. I find that interesting in that the aviation industry does standardize its instrumentation. The behavior and symbology on on airline TCAS (collision avoidance) systems are all common.
It would seem logical then that shipping lines would also have standardized instrumentation and that base level navigation symbols would be universal. Certainly major carriers such as Evergreen and Maersk Line, who also have sister business units in the shipbuilding business, should be able to standardize navigation instrumentation across their fleets regardless of vessel type.
The key issue for the harbor pilots, whose specific job is navigating vessels of all types in and out of local harbors, is the divergence of the ships they must pilot. Containerships, supertankers, cruise ships, even some military vessels all require the harbor pilots local knowledge to safely make it to berth. When each ship has its own navigation system, that process becomes potentially hazardous.
Shipbuilders outsource the electronics that are put into ships from electronics manufacturers. For the most part, these guys are the same folks who service the aviation industry. It would seem reasonable for the International Maritime Organization and the UN to specify a basic set of system requirements similar to how the FAA and ICAO work.
OAKLAND, Calif. - Eric Robinson stepped onto the bridge of the container ship Horizon Pacific and peered at a computer monitor depicting San Francisco Bay. Ship icons blipped clearly in the virtual water, but the meaning of some of the other symbols was murky. Robinson, a San Francisco ship pilot, makes his living guiding supertankers, naval vessels and cruise ships through the bay's treacherous waters, and his job is to adapt quickly. But he never knows what electronic navigation gear he will face when he takes the helm. And he thinks that should change. The government, the International Maritime Organization and the shipping industry are exploring how to bring some order to the jumble of electronic navigation aids proliferating on the seas — a movement that has been given greater impetus by an accident in San Francisco Bay earlier this month. |
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