IAMU News - Special Edition

ODESA NATIONAL MARITIME ACADEMY

CONCEPTUAL MODEL OF INFORMATION CONTROL FOR A SAFE PASSAGE SHIP

When Radar and ARRPA are used for safe navigation in coastal waters there arise mistakes of navigators, which result in accidents, due to insufficient knowledge of restrictions of the speci-fied devices. From the analysis made it is possible to draw a conclusion that the majority of failures occur due to the fact that navigators cannot assess in due time danger of collision when navigating in constrained conditions, and especially, in unfamiliar water areas where there are many dangers.

For the specified reason we offer a new way of safe passage. Hereafter the control of a close quar-ter's situation will be made not on vessel, but on coast. For this purpose the conceptual model of in-formation control on coast for a safe passage vessel at sea has been developed.

To study safe passage of vessels in natural conditions is inconvenient because of impossibility to change a situation of close quarters properly. For this reason it is necessary to create model of a situation of a safe passage. It is not a description of the real devices of system, but simulates its behavior.

There are models of two kinds - conceptual and physical. The kind of model depends on what as-pect of the researched phenomenon are most essential - quantitative and qualitative contents of the known information.

The conceptual model describes the qualitative aspect of researched process.

The physical model describes, in mathematical formulas, dependence between parameters, which characterize quantitative correlation.

To control work of model a system is created. We shall determine a system as combination of ele-ments of various natures intended to achieve of an object in view by defining function of each of them.

During control there is an intensive information interchange between elements of a control system, the volume and speed of processing where of grows sharply. If an element of system is a machine, a device and a human such system can be named as human-machine.

Information control for a safe passage is such organization of assessment of a condition of system and interaction between ships, comparison of corresponding parameters of their position with the adopted values and development of necessary action. With information control of a safe passage of ships three basic elements are used - the purpose, ob-ject and influence on it to bring to the set condition.

The purpose of information control is maintenance of a passage of vessels at safe distance, in view of navigational situation in the area.

As object of control we shall understand the hull of a vessel, which is usually represented as a point located in the center of its weight. For simplification it is deemed to be located on midship frame.

Influence is intended to change a condition of object which problem is to bring it to the set condi-tion. We shall consider two kinds of influence - external and controlling:

• External influence represents uncontrollable on size and time influence of environment on object under control (wind, current, rough sea, shoals, interaction with other ships).
• Control influence represents aimed application of forces from ship devices on parame-ters of a condition of object. Such influence is formed either on the vessel (the screw, a rudder, the thruster, the anchor device), or outside it (an anchor, interaction with a berth other ships).

For simplification the model of information control for a safe passage is necessary to divide into the following sub models (i.e. to make decomposition):

• Information control on situations of close quarter;
• Information control as maneuver of a vessel;
• Information control on ranges of safe avoiding courses.

Structural and a functional chart of conceptual model

With the account of the above stated dependences conceptual model of the information con-trol for a safe passage ships can be presented as on fig. 1.

Figure 1 - Conceptual model of a system of the information control for a safe passage of vessels

With the account of the supreme offers the functional chart of the system of controlling situations of a safe passage of ships is shown on fig. 2.

Figure 2 - Functional chart of a system of the information control for a safe passage of vessels

Suggested construction of conceptual model of a system of information control for a safe passage of vessels is intended for its designing and practical construction. It gives a new way of maintenance of safe navigation of vessels in coastal waters on the vessels and CRS with use of ?IS. It can serve as the initial stage on a way of construction of a vessel without crew. It can form the ba-sis for development of expert systems of decision-making for development of recommendations for navigation and navigators.

Prof. Anatoliy MALTSEV
Ph.D. MAI BA LINH
The Odesa National Maritime Academy
8, Didrikson street,
Odessa, 65029, Ukraine
mas@tccs.odessa.ua