- New developments in ship weather routing.
Article
Bib No.:
- 276520
Authors:
- Spaans, J.A.
- Stoter, P.H.
Publication Date:
- 1995
Physical Description:
- pp.95-106
Citation:
- Navigation, VOL. 43 NO. 169, 1995
Parent Details:
- VOL. 43 NO. 169, 1995
Media Type:
- Article
Collection:
- Library Collection
Language:
- English
Abstract:
- Since the introduction of weather routing services in the late 1950's route advice has been given to shipmaster essentially from shorebased centers. Advances in computer and communication technology allowed the development of on board systems that present optimum routes to the navigation team, based on weather info received by satellite-email, an on board climatological database and an advanced ship performance database. Operational weather routing services - either on board or onshore - provide minimum time routes (MTR) or minimum fuel routes (MRF) for a given expected time of arrival (ETA) under constant rev/min or constant engine power (1, 2). Recently the SPOS-system has been introduced where the MRF is calculated with the engine power varied too. Variation of both course and power provides a more rigorous optimisation and saves therefore extra fuel. The so called "isopone method" is described in this paper and earlier published in (3, 4). The prediction of the ship performance - speed, pitch, roll, shipping of green water, slamming, fuel consumption, power, rev/min - along the selected route should be an essential part of a routing system. During the trip the performance of the vessel should be monitored and compared with the prediction in order to validate the ship's performance model. Presentation and animation of all received weather data on the computer screen is a side benefit of an on board weather routing system. The Ship Performance Optimisation System (SPOS) developed by Meteo Consult and Shell Research, both in the Netherlands, supplies all functions mentioned above and will be described in the paper.