Coleman 1
Autonomous shipping, for a very dangerous industry to work in with many safety
hazards, can autonomous shipping be the future. Being a merchant mariner myself I am against
fully autonomous ships. Automation has it place within the world and I agree it is very helpful in
this industry. We use automation on our vessel in order to open and close ballast valves, which
allows us to ballast the vessel to keep the vessel from capsizing while loading and unloading
cargo. Ballasting allows the vessel to travel from port to port without capsizing the vessel as
well. Automation is also used on our generators in order to start one and allow them to
synchronize with one another. The dangers I see with automation are the potential for it to fail
while trying to make a split-second decision. We have instances were the vessel is in rough
weather and current starts to pull the vessel in the wrong direction we need to have a person that
knows what to do and can quickly make the needed adjustment to properly move the ship back
onto the proper course. Automation is used within the steering aspects of the vessel, but at times
it can not overcome certain issues that can be adjusted accordingly by a human.
Human error, the cause for building and progressively trying to move autonomous
shipping. Many incidents within the maritime industry are found to be from human error. In this
industry there are long days and short nights and you have to work hard to accomplish many of
the tasks that are given to you, but for the last 20 years or so many laws have been implemented
to the number of work to rest hours you have through out a 24 hour period. These laws have
been put into effect to help eliminate these human errors.
Leaning towards autonomy will take jobs from many people. Ships have many onboard
maintenance procedures such as oil changes for the generators, main engines, spring inspections
on explosion door covers and many other services. Without a crew aboard he vessel it would be
hard to care for the vessel from afar. The crew makes sure the vessel stays operational and able
Coleman 2
to move from port to port. Several technologies have led to the theory of designing and building
a fully autonomous ship. These technologies are machine learning, the technological
advancement in sensors and connectivity while at sea. Todays world we are all about technology
everyone has a cell phone and knows they are prone to bugs and potential hackers. Ships can be
hacked as well, sure they will have better fire walls and be much harder to take control of, but it
is not impossible. These are thought about when deciding if autonomous ships are worth the
investment. Autonomous ships have a potential for safety risks.
Autonomous shipping has pros and cons when you discuss the topic of safety. As
unmanned vessels other will not be aboard if a catastrophic accident were to take place, but also
with an unmanned vessel you have no way to control an incident from becoming a much larger
problem. If the ship were to have an issue with its onboard pilot system and astray from its
course, it runs the risk of a grounding or crashing into another vessel that is making way through
the same body of water. Being on the great lakes we travel through multiple rivers on our travels.
Detroit river, Saint Mary’s river and the saint Claire river are rivers we travel through and in the
summer time and there are thousands of boats and personal watercraft that travel through these
rivers jet skiing, fishing, tubing and many other activities running autonomous ships through
heavily populated area put these innocent by standers at risk if something were to go wrong with
the ship while making way through these restricted waterways. When the ships are manned you
have looks outs that can see where these individuals are in respect to the ships travel course.
These individuals can relay to the captain and he can then decide if he needs to change course to
avoid people that are utilizing the river for extra curricular activities. Grounding, collisions and
pedestrians are risk assessments that must be taken into consideration when pushing for a fully
autonomous industry.
Coleman 3
Autonomous shipping would take a while to implement, it is not something that would
happen over-night. Many companies would stand to benefit from autonomous ships. The initial
cost would be pricey on the fore front, but with every investment it should start to make you
money over time until you initial investment is paid off and you can collect full profit. If they
implement fully electric ships as they have discussed with autonomous shipping this would cut
down many costs for these companies. They will save money on consumables such as oil, fuel,
food for the crew, and labor costs. The articulated tug and barge that I sail on spends about 1.5
million dollars each time we fill up the vessel and we fuel up about twice a hitch. We burn
between 3,000 to 5,000 gallons per day while pushing a barge across the lakes. These engine on
this vessel are also very worn out and they leak oil, and we burn 200 gallons plus per day in oil.
