With ports around the world getting busier, and new port developments opening and expanding at faster rates, the safe management of vessels within these crowded zones is more complex than ever before. Around the clock vessels are coming into, berthing and departing from areas that have become hives of commercial activity, making port congestion commonplace. Getting the tracking and traffic flow right is crucial for pilots and harbour masters for the sake of safety, and commercial success.
Traditional methods of harbour management have been augmented by significant technological developments, particularly in the last twenty years, and none more useful to port managers than the radar centric Vessel Traffic Service (VTS) systems. Sea Freight Middle East tracked down Shailendra Shukla, general manager of Transas Middle East to discover the latest developments in the industry from one of the companies responsible for pioneering the technology.
With broadband becoming so much more prevalent today, then it is possible that wireless connectivity could cover a whole region.
“Transas itself is an acronym of transport safety systems, so safety has always been at the core of the company, and the systems we’ve developed come from the original goal of improving maritime safety,” explains Shukla. The company began delivering vector based electronic charts in 1990 as the digital era was dawning in commercial shipping.
For 600 years people had been using paper based charts. Scanning these just gave an electronic picture of the same chart, but one that couldn’t be manipulated or worked with in a very helpful way. “The vector based charts were a step up from that, and essentially involve layers upon layers of information with a lot of embedded intelligence,” he says. This was a crucial development as it made the charts interactive.
“It is important to consider that sea lanes are not static. There are environmental changes, wrecks, pipelines, a major advantage of electronic charts over paper ones is that all this information is corrected on a weekly basis through an automatic mechanism.”
The rapid development of software capabilities during the 1990s allowed the electronic cartographic programs to be harnessed and integrated with other technologies, which is how the modern VTS systems came into being.
Radar surveillance is today at the heart of the system and this forms the heart of the vessel traffic monitoring capability. “The idea is to detect traffic, then this data is then transposed onto accurate, up to date charts, and that gives port operators a real-time picture.”
The most capable systems now incorporate information from radar, meteorological sensors, VHF direction finders, and Automatic Identification Systems (AIS), to give an exact picture of the port to the harbour master who can control activity from a central tower. The software package reconciles the information from all of these sources.
All of this data is recorded and time stamped to provide a reliable account of what happened should an incident occur. “Who communicated what and when is easily traceable,” says Shukla.
Of course, there is a cost to deploying all of this technology, and depending on the scope of the port operations a harbour master might decide one radar is sufficient, or that multiple sensors are required. “Radar waves travel in a straight line so there is a maximum area of scope a single sensor can have. In most cases this is further complemented by CCTV systems, mainly to cover blind areas, but also sometimes it’s important to actually see what is being detected.”
Within the remit of the ISPS code ships trading in SOLAS contracted waters require an AIS system. With regard to traffic management this unique vessel stamp adds to the capability of the VTS system. “In the event a large vessel hid a smaller vessel from radar, then AIS would denote two unique ID numbers and alert the operator of the fact that there is another boat out there,” thus by combining the technologies the system makes the invisible visible, improving port safety.
Quieter ports may dismiss the system as an expense, but vessel traffic doesn’t have to be on a par with Singapore or Jebel Ali to make valuable use of such systems. Of course there is a need to justify the cost, but from safety point of view it will be harder for ports lacking the technology to attract shipping lines if a neighbouring port is well equipped to manage vessel flows more safely.
“Of course it is necessary for any port to weigh up how much the system can really offer and that will nearly always be judged on the volume of commercial activity taking place in that port.”
Where the systems have more recently come to justify themselves is when the ‘MI’ or Management-Information element is added, stepping the basic VTS up to a VTMIS. With a VTMIS all of the data picked up by the software is incorporated into the financial records of the port.
“The amount of the information coming in and going out all the time can be immense. The mission of the port is to provide an efficient service which allows for the shortest turnaround times. In order that this can be carried out a great deal of facilities, stevedoring, wharf space, tug boats are supplied. It is essential that all of these facilities are reliably recorded, so that an invoice can be drawn up.”
With these systems there will be no dispute at a later date about services and it’s possible that, with an on-line system, by the time the vessel is ready to move, the invoice is there and ready to be handed over.
As environmental legislation in every field is tightening globally the ability to track and trace offenders will become, if not a requirement, an expectation of ports in the Middle East. “The systems can play an important environmental control and enforcement role,” explains Shukla. The overwhelming majority of vessels in the Gulf adhere to the strict rules and regulations governing the clearing of bilges and hazardous dumping. However, there are always exceptions to the rule, and when violations do occur proving it can
be difficult.
“It is possible with a tracking system like this to look into time stamped records and see where a pollution incident has come from. With additional technology it’s quite conceivable that in a court of law you could use this evidence to secure a conviction.”
With the technology at the level it is today it would be easy to assume that the current capabilities will simply be honed, but the industry already has its sights set on the next great revolution in traffic management.
“With broadband becoming so much more prevalent today, then it is possible that wireless connectivity could cover a whole region. Sensors and systems could all plug into this, allowing a much greater degree of shared information then ever before.”
This is the concept of e-navigation and it’s something Transas has recognised will be dominant in the years to come. In the last meeting of the IALA – International Association of Marine Aids to Navigation and Lighthouse Authorities, the governing committee came up with a working definition of e-navigation: E-Navigation is the collection, integration and display of maritime information onboard and ashore by electronic means to enhance berth-to-berth navigation and related services, safety and security at sea and protection of the marine environment.
A mouthful it may be, but far reaching too. The topic is already under consideration with the IMO, so now is the time the maritime sector has the opportunity to map out and develop a clear strategic vision of how best to integrate and utilise the technologies at its disposal.
“The main issue is how do we share and make sense of all of this data that we are currently recording? Ultimately e-navigation will be making sense of this great mosaic. That means vessel to vessel, nation states to nation states, could be incorporated into a very powerful tool,” Shukla enthuses.
The time will come when the vessel, cargo, last port of call, direction of travel and potential hazards can be shared instantaneously amongst the players ashore and onboard to create a much safer environment in congested waters.
Only last month an accident occurred as the vessel New Flame, metal headed out of port into the busy lanes off Gibraltar and careered straight into the Trom Gurtrud, a laden oil tanker. Disaster was narrowly avoided thanks to the double hull design but, with automated alerts and greater co-ordination between all localised parties through e-navigation, the sinking of the bulk carrier New Flame may well have been averted.
Approximately 450 of the world’s ports are currently equipped with relatively sophisticated VTS/VTMIS systems, of which over one quarter have been installed by Transas. Regionally, the firm is capitalising on the burgeoning sea freight and oil and gas sector. The Egyptian Port of Damietta and Noshar in Iran are recent additions to the Transas VTS family, and most recently the Port of Mombassa in Kenya placed an order through the group’s Middle East office.
Whilst it is not yet mandatory to have a VTS to operate a commercial port, the guidelines and recommendations from the maritime community’s leading authorities suggest that in the not too distant future it will be very difficult to fulfil their criteria without one.
With the concept of integrated situational awareness reaching new heights, the possibilities for safer port management should excite seafarers and habour masters alike.
Sweeping upgrades are more easily implemented than ever before, and a new era of navigation with fewer accidents and cleaner seas is well within reach of the best players in the industry.
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