MOL Installs Anti-Grounding Alert Software Fleetwide
Japanese shipping giant Mitsui O.S.K. Lines (MOL) plans to enhance the safety of its fleet with a navigational risk monitoring system capable of predicting the danger of grounding and alerting shoreside teams.
A day after successfully concluding the world's first sea trial of unmanned ship operation from port to port, the company announced that its fleet of over 700 vessels has adopted the vessel grounding risk monitoring software system that will help in enhancing safety measures. The cloud-based solution has the ability to intelligently predict the risk of grounding in advance and alert shoreside teams, giving them greater situational awareness in the event of any possible risks.
The system will also monitor risk factors such as the formation of heavy weather on a vessel’s given route. It will also be able to monitor risks when a ship is anchored and moored.
The solution has been developed in collaboration with NAPA, a leading maritime software, services and data analysis provider and class society ClassNK.
“We believe that the sure management of navigational risks is the absolute necessity for maritime industries, and this system does that, both analyzing grounding risks and alerting them. We believe that it will help to prevent accidental grounding during ocean voyages,” said Satoshi Fujii, General Manager of Smart Shipping Division at MOL.
The system does not require any onboard hardware installation or crew input. By combining several existing data sources, such as position data, ship data, sea depth and navigational charts, it creates a simple and easy-to-implement way to reduce grounding risk.
The adoption of the system comes a day after the shipping line completed the world's first sea trial of unmanned ship operation, a landmark event in MOL's autonomous shipping program. The tria commenced in Tsuruga Port in Fukui Prefecture and concluded in Sakai Port in Tottori Prefecture, and it involved two different types of ships, a coastal containership and a coastal car ferry.