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European Space Agency

Press Release

Safer harbour operations with EGNOS
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16 December 2002

It will soon be much safer for ships to enter and move around narrow
harbours with help from a system that will enable accurate navigation
information to compliment radar signals. 

Ships currently enter harbours relying on just radar images and verbal 
information from the team on the adjacent tug boats. Recently a 
harbour in Hamburg, Germany tested a new system called MARLET (the
Maritime LOPOS EGNOS Test Bed) developed by Lopos Technologies GmbH,
who initiated the project with sponsorship from the European Space
Agency (ESA).

The demonstration of MARLET showed the usefulness of EGNOS (the
European Geostationary Navigation Overlay System) and Galileo for
vessel operations in the harbour of Hamburg and on the river Elbe.
MARLET greatly improves the quality of the AIS standard - the
Automatic Information System for international shipping - which is
driven by the Global Navigation Satellite System (GNSS).

AIS is an independent, self-organising system. AIS equipment onboard
each (commercial) ship permanently broadcasts a vessel identifier,
direction, speed and other information to all other ships and coastal
stations within reach of a maritime VHF communications link.

When implementing EGNOS quality standards on all positioning sensors
in AIS, one of the sources of uncertainty in AIS is eliminated.

With accurate (better than 1 metre) GNSS-positioning information,
combined with a controlled communication link, it is possible to have
a Vessel Traffic Management and Information System (VTMIS) in which
ultimately radar and electronic chart images can be combined, for the
benefit of safer manoeuvres in confined waters.

A number of test runs aboard tugs have been performed. In early
December the large passenger ship MAXIM GORKIY was supported with
EGNOS technology during the most demanding port manoeuvre: tug-
assisted turning and docking. In addition, a synthetic aperture GNSS
antenna has been developed, showing much improved position accuracy.

Follow-on studies are to elaborate a standard for an enhanced AIS
system that will be usable for harbour operations and also probably
inland waterway navigation. 

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