Multi-ship collision avoidance decision-making and coordination mechanism in Mixed Navigation Scenarios

Abstract

The increasing attention and rapid development of intelligent ship technologies makes it possible to real applications to merchant shippings. The mixture of conventional and intelligent ships will be the most likely new scenario in the future. Multi-ship collision avoidance decision-making and the cooperation between them are the keys to ensure safety. To make decisions that both meet the requirements of safety and the principles of International Regulations for Preventing Collision at Sea (COLREGs), collision avoidance decision-making models for conventional and intelligent ships are formulated, respectively. The former is based on the COLREGs action clauses and human thinking patterns, whereas the latter is formulated through quantitative analysis of collision risk, rule compliance, ship yaw angle and drift distance. A collision-avoidance intention notification mechanism is formed, and the sequential decision is performed that enables real-time decision update. The simulation results show that the closest distances between ships in all scenarios are not less than the predefined safe distance, and ships comply with COLREGs. In the mixed scenarios, the intention notification mechanism can adapt to the impact of COLREGs violation by one ship, so as to reduce the operation complexity and course change frequency.