Navigational safety assessment based on Markov-Model approach

Abstract

Safety analysis of complex technical systems currently operating in the transport sector is an urgent challenge for the global maritime industry, which suffers from a lack of information about the levels of risk and the consequences of their incorrect assessment. Among the requirements for vessel management and operations the importance of having a highly professional crew and up-to-date navigational equipment. Navigational safety is one of the components of the integral concept of “safety” for a seagoing ship. Assessment of integral safety is based on assessments of the individual safety components. In this study, the focus is on “navigational safety”, which is primarily understood as ensuring safe operation of a vessel in specific navigation conditions, ensuring safe control and maneuvering of the vessel, ship position monitoring, heading control, sufficient depth margin under the keel along the route, taking into account its actual draft and subsidence in shallow water, and sea disturbance. In the offered research on the basis of the identified states of navigational safety, the graphic model of process and matrix of transition probabilities in the general form with use of homogeneous Markov model of change of navigational safety of a vessel, with discrete time and presence of absorbing state is formed. The proposed Markov process model can be used to assess vessel navigational safety when establishing possible states of navigational safety with significant probability to assess ship safety and make decisions to ensure safe vessel operation.