1) The document discusses the results of the BaSSy project which developed tools to help assess maritime risks like collisions and groundings in a more efficient manner. 2) It describes how the BaSSy tool allows estimation of collision and grounding risks and was adopted as a standard by the International Association of Marine Aids to Navigation and Lighthouse Authorities. 3) Case studies analyzed real accident data and typical timeframes for vessels to react before collisions and groundings. This information was used to develop a dynamic warning concept for Vessel Traffic Service operators to facilitate their work.

1. TRANSPORTFORUM Linköping, Jan. 13-14, 2010
Static data used to handle dynamic
– real time risks
Peter Grundevik
SSPA Sweden
peter.grundevik@sspa.se
www.sspa.se
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2. BaSSy project info
• http://www.surship.eu/project/bassy/overview
• http://www.sjofartsverket.se/forskningsdb/
• Jan 2006 - June 2009
• Partners
– SSPA Sweden, Co-ordinator & Research
– VTT (Technical Research Centre of Finland)
– DTU (Technical University of Denmark)
– MSI Design (Sweden)
– GateHouse (Denmark)
– Chalmers Shipping & Marine Technology (Sweden)
• BaSSy advisory group from Denmark, Sweden, Finland, Åland
• Financiers: Nordic Council of Ministers, Danish Maritime Fund, Finnish
Ministry, Finnish Maritime Administration, Swedish Maritime
Administration, VINNOVA
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3. Background
• Cope with maritime risks
– Rigorous risk analysis to identify most relevant risk reduction efforts
– Proposed efforts have to be assessed in forehand
– Commonly used risk analysis methods are complex and time
consuming
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4. BaSSy results
• BaSSy tool, that allows estimation of the risk caused by
collision and grounding
– efficient & easier risk analysis and assessments
– IALA took it as standard (IWRAP IALA Waterway Risk Assessment Program)
– assessment using same theoretical basis
– easier to compare and validate risk analyses
– gathered experiences into a database
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5. BaSSy results
• Case study in the Sea of Åland
- FSA measures study
- traffic separation zones
- reporting route plans
- blackout notification
- modified route layout
- traffic control
- Proposal
- Traffic separation scheme
- Deep water route
- Accepted by IMO MSC for
enforcement
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6. BaSSy results
• Collision and grounding
analysis in the Baltic Sea
• Web database www.vtt.fi/proj/bassy/
– guidelines for risk assessment FSA process using BaSSy tool
– links for software downloading
– Documents and user results
The objectives of the BaSSy FSA web pages
The BaSSy FSA web pages are established to provide to the coastal states of the Baltic Sea a portal with an
access to the tools and guidelines for performing Formal Safety Assessment (FSA) studies in order to
analyse the risks in the Baltic Sea area and to assess the effectiveness of different risk control options to
decrease the risks.
The tools available on these web pages were mainly developed in the Nordic project BaSSy (Baltic Sea
Safety). (Read more information about BaSSy)
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7. BaSSy results
• Human factor analysis – impact on risks
– Designing of a S-mode radar interface
– Comparison of using north up /
head-up electronic chart presentation
• Man Technology Organisation profiling of a VTS centre
– Identify human factors design discrepancies
– Operational procedures, organisation
– Human system interaction Control centre, Workstation, Monitoring system
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8. BaSSy results
• VTS collision & grounding warning concept
– VTS supervise ship traffic with radar and AIS (+ VHF radio)
– Operator may call the ship if collision risk / passing fairway limitations
– Interesting coverage area increases
– Manual survey & frequent analysis of big areas - heavy
– Automatic tool identifying potential dangerous situations
- facilitate the VTS operator work
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9. EfficienSea
• Further development of the dynamical warning concept
within EfficienSea
– EfficienSea (Efficient, Safe and Sustainable Traffic at Sea) is an EU
Baltic Sea Region project, 2009-2012, DAMSA - Lead Partner
– Work activity: WP 6.3 Dynamic algorithm for analyzing online-
situations Partners: SSPA, VTT, Finnish Maritime Administration
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10. Study steps
• Interviews with VTS operators - needs and demands for a
decision-making support tool
• Questionnaire
• Identification and analysis of typical accident scenarios
• AIS data - important source. Quality and limits investigated
• C++ code - convert AIS raw data
• MATLAB codes - analyse the data
• Test case stydy - analyse typical distances to fairway
limitations and passing ships
• Dynamical warning system - decision-making concept for
VTS operators - three separate modes;
– Grounding
– Collision
– Identification of drifting vessels
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11. Accident case studies
• 160 different real groundings, contacts, collisions
and near-collisions have been analysed
• Criteria for sorting out a critical situation from a
normal one
• Actual time frames
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12. Typical time to react - groundings
Fairway
Route Divergence Distance Distance
Time to react – Exceedance - Speed -
- minutes before Route-Ground - Fairway-
Grounding of ships minutes before knots
grounding nm Ground -
grounding
AVERAGE 3.1 1.3 0.4 0.2 10.2
Channels, harbours, MAX 15.0 6.7 2.4 1.0 38.0
archipelagos MIN 0.1 0.1 0.0 0.0 1.0
STDEV 3.7 1.4 0.5 0.2 7.2
AVERAGE 19.5 8.9 3.4 1.7 9.7
MAX 110.0 52.0 18.3 9.1 20.0
Open water
MIN 0.5 0.5 0.2 0.1 0.8
STDEV 21.3 11.7 4.3 2.3 3.9
AVERAGE 12.0 4.9 2.2 0.7 9.0
MAX 110.0 52.0 18.3 9.1 38.0
All
MIN 0.1 0.1 0.0 0.0 0.8
STDEV 17.7 9.4 3.5 1.8 5.6
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13. Typical time to react - collisions
Distance usual
Manoeuvre for Distance to
manoeuvre
collision When vessel the other
collision
avoidance started collision vessel when
avoidance
Time to react – should have avoiding actions starting Speed -
should be
Collision of ships been started - - collision knots
started,
minutes minutes avoiding
recognising
before before actions
the other
colliding colliding - nm
vessel - nm
AVERAGE 12.16 1.45 1.47 0.14 10.26
MAX 36.00 3.00 6.00 0.48 22.00
Overtaking
MIN 0.43 0.10 0.02 0.01 0.00
STDEV 13.69 1.31 2.02 0.16 4.71
AVERAGE 8.54 1.65 2.66 0.52 10.83
Non MAX 30.00 7.50 8.75 2.00 18.00
Overtaking MIN 0.92 0.08 0.10 0.02 3.00
STDEV 6.89 1.70 1.92 0.50 4.47
AVERAGE 9.01 1.69 2.27 0.47 10.47
MAX 36.00 7.50 7.50 2.00 22.00
All
MIN 0.43 0.08 0.02 0.01 0.00
STDEV 8.11 1.66 1.68 0.49 4.56
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14. Conclusions from the accident studies
• Low CPA are common
• Overtaking in narrow fairways - small margins
• Sometimes small margins even in open sea
• Enough time to warn before groundings in open sea
• Sometimes also enough time to warn in limited
fairways
• Little time to warn vessels before collision
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15. Traffic distribution
AIS message 17 protocol –
Shipping lane/ intended route
Leaving route
Fairway limits
route plan
Exceeding fairway limits
• Ship waypoints and/or route plan report
• Check route divergence of vessels
• Could lead to earlier warnings for the VTS operator
• Could also be used for ship collision warnings
• Updating crucial
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16. Statistical + dynamic/real-time AIS data
• Historical AIS data for the area is used to map
the traffic behaviour
• Real-time AIS data is used to determine possible
present critical collision and grounding situations
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17. Cell analysis
Speed
Heading
Middle of river
Speed
Heading
At quay
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18. Cell analysis
Heading for
west
east
Middle of
fairway
Speed
distributions
for all ships
(left)
For ships
>100m (right)
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19. Cell analysis
Anchored
ships
Course
Heading
Speed
COG-Head
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20. Three scenarios investigated - modes designed
• Graphical module for ship collision warning
– including critical passages
– indicator and active warning system
• Module for ship grounding warning
– based on AIS statistics in predefined grid cells in a fairway area
– identifies unusual speeds, courses and positions of certain vessel
classes (ship size and type)
• Module for identification of drifting vessels
– special conditions for a drifting ship can be identified by
exceptional speed and course
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21. Ship Collision warning
• Graphical support
• Identify passages at
critical points
• Simple information -
handled easily
• Information only to
involved vessels
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22. Ship grounding warning
• Grid of cells defined - more
sensitive if size & form
follow fairway
• Real traffic statistics
• Saving the data in a matrix
• Flexible handling adjusted to
new traffic scenarios
• Small computer resources
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23. Ship grounding warning
• Every time a ship enters a cell, the
matrix is called
Empty
• Check if ship exceeds typical parts of
the cells
Grid
– course over grounds
– headings
Blue =
– speed ranges data points
– fairway areas
• Time span is typically about 12 minutes
• Easier to detect un-normal situations
early in wider fairways
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24. Identification of drifting vessels
• Statistically every ship has 2-4 blackouts/ year
• Drifters seldom report to authorities
• Important other duties  late reporting
• Algorithm identifying drifting vessels
– speed drops, divergence of COG and heading
• Not all drifters can be identified
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25. All: collision, grounding, drifting warning modes
• Downloading newest electronic sea chart common
• Also possible to download
– common routes for the area
– typical traffic distributions and densities
– efficient dynamic information about the fairway
• dangerous parts of the planned route
• alternative routes
• appropriate speeds
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26. Fairway analysis
Halmstad
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27. Cell analysis close to accidents
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28. Cell analysis close to accidents
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29. Conclusions
• Identifying collision and grounding candidates can
support VTS operator
• Collision scenarios do not offer a lot of time 
Simple visualisation of suitable meeting spot to
avoid difficult parts
• Only vessels involved need to be informed. Number
of warnings - limited
• Grounding scenario might be detected early based
on AIS data and statistics
• Algorithm for identification of drifters can be useful
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30. Discussion - Questions
• How much time is needed to alert bridge personnel?
• Methods to alert bridge personnel and to be used on the VTS?
• Contact between VTS operator and the ship - VHF radio?
• What is the responsibility of the VTS operator?
• What is a safe passage - appropriate CPA?
• VTS can get support from a system - relay on it?
• Concepts may be used onboard - not only on VTS
• VTS operator and support system, has full focus on ship traffic,
may be used to get complementary eyes
• VTS has a strategic view – common time frame: 10 min range
• Bridge crew - operational view down to 1 minute perspective
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