May I congratulate Chris Perkins and Tony Redfern for their excellent paper in the May issue of the Journal. For many years I have read in the Journal, and on occasions listened to, learned ladies and gentlemen discoursing on the subjects of safe navigation and collision avoidance. Also to what I believe are their misguided wanderings into ‘ship domains’ and assumptions that ships behave as atomic particles. Thus it was very refreshing to read the latest and practical contribution by Chris and Tony. Well done chaps!

This paper summarizes the results of Phase 3 of the Arctic Tanker Risk Analysis Project (ATRA) which provided a prototype Tanker Navigation Safety System (TNSS). TNSS is a ship-board risk management system capable of route planning and decision support based upon a knowledge database. The objective of the project was to provide timely risk assessment information to a mariner or decision-maker in a system capable of integration with existing ECDIS or shipboard PC systems. The historical information was to include: accident location, frequency and type, ice, wind, visibility, environmental sensitivity and other factors. The specifications of the TNSS prototype were expanded so that risk could be assessed for each track in a route plan by applying a predictive accident model patterned after the navigation and collision avoidance process.

The risks involved in maritime transport are very much greater now than was formerly the case. This has been accompanied by a considerable increase in the damage resulting from certain accidents. Maritime traffic management has been made necessary not only for reasons of safety but also productivity and comprises two main types of measure: first, laying down and enforcing suitable regulations and secondly, providing navigators with real time information which is not available to them on board from the Vessel Traffic Services (VTS).

Section 2 of this paper is a general description of the techniques used in maritime traffic management and an account of possibilities for the future. Section 3 describes a feasibility study for a traffic monitoring aid system based on VTS and using a knowledge based system.

This paper is based on one which was first published in the journal, Recherche Transports Sécurité, issue no. 9, 1993.

This, and the following three papers were presented at the Royal Institute of Navigation meeting ‘Management of Air Traffic Flow in Europe' on 15 November 1989.

One of the growth industries in Europe is the production of articles in newspapers and programmes on radio and television which deal with European air traffic control. They usually have titles like, ‘The Crisis in ATC’, or ‘European Air Traffic Meltdown’. Jane's Airport Review, in October 1989, had an article entitled ‘Wanted: One ATC System for Europe’.