Application of an Automatic Collision Avoidance Function on a Ship Handling Simulator to the Congested Sea Areas

Abstract

In near future, it is expected that many advanced support functions such as an automatic collision avoidance function will be installed to ships for upgrading navigation safety and efficiency. For the sake of evaluating the effect of these functions, experiences of the use of the functions are essential. Expert judgment based on the experience of the use of such newly developed functions is one of the best tool for evaluating their safety and efficiency. To reproduce the environment for making it possible to experience such system in a ship-handling simulator, we made a framework for introducing the advanced functions to all ships in the simulator. Then we introduced an automatic collision avoidance function to all ships to control them enabling proper manoeuvre in congested sea area including collision avoidance. To show the effectiveness of the function, we conducted a series of simulation runs using the function in congested sea areas. In this paper, after brief introduction of the automatic collision avoidance function, the results of simulation runs in congested sea areas and the effectiveness of the function are discussed.