DECISION-SUPPORT FOR WINTER NAVIGATION OPERATIONS

  • Kulkarni, K. (Speaker)
  • Mashrura Musharraf (Speaker)
  • Cong Liu (Speaker)
  • Pentti Kujala (Speaker)

Activity: Talk or presentationOral presentation

Description

Winter navigation in the Baltic Sea involves ensuring safety and efficiency of vessel traffic in ice-covered waters. Icebreakers are often employed to create safe directed pathways (dirways) for vessels to complete their journeys through thick ice fields. Icebreakers are a limited and expensive resource and the number of vessels waiting for assistance often outnumber the available icebreakers. Icebreaker usage also greatly affects the energy consumption of the traffic system. Due to this, the icebreaker management is required to prioritize assistance mission, considering the overall waiting time and fuel consumption while ensuring safety. This decision-making is currently handled entirely by human experts (captains of icebreakers) based on their years of experience. The decisions require careful consideration of several dynamic factors including weather elements (wind, pressure, currents), ice conditions (topography, thickness, concentration) and vessel characteristics (ice class, hull type, deadweight). There is potential for a data-based tool to support the experts in making these complex decisions. This work describes the development of a simulation model built in collaboration with the Finnish Transport and Infrastructure Agency (Väylävirasto) to visualize and compare alternate traffic scenarios in winter navigation in the North Baltic Sea (Bay of Bothnia).
Period08.09.202309.09.2023
Event titleKotka Maritime Research Conference
Event typeConference
LocationKotka, FinlandShow on map
Degree of RecognitionLocal