Real-Time Simulation of Ship Impact for Crew Training

Abstract

Real-time simulation of marine accidents and representation in a realistic, virtual environment may be an efficient way to train emergency procedures for ship's crews and thus improve safety at sea. However, although various fast, simplified methods have been presented over the past decades, the real-time simulation of ship grounding and collision events poses a number of challenges. This paper presents a set of theoretical models and methods by which it is relatively easy to implement collision and grounding modeling capabilities in existing, real-time marine simulators. Most notably, the paper contains methods for fast prediction of collision and grounding motion and a method that transforms any motion into a set of forces. The latter method allows that the grounding and collision impact modules interact with the simulation software only through specification of external forces on the hull. The efficiency of the developed procedures is demonstrated by three examples: ship berthing (impact with quay), ship grounding on a pinnacle rock, and ship-to-ship collision. Although the paper specifically addresses ship impact problems, it is believed that a part of the presented methods would be advantageous to use in other types of time simulation where it is desirable to switch between direct time integration and some other known, stabilized solution, without a major redesign of the program architecture.