Damen Shipyards Group has won an award for the Human Machine Interface that it has been developing over the past two years for its Next Generation Tug Series. The UX Design Awards are intended to honour innovative solutions that add value to applications, technologies and services through positive experiences, thereby strengthening people’s abilities, enabling novel applications and facilitating access to new fields of knowledge.

The Human Machine Interface (HMI) developed by Damen in partnership with VanBerlo has won a Product 2019 Award. The system was created in close consultation with captains and chief engineers to improve the safety and efficiency of Damen’s tugs by providing the crew with the information needed to control and operate the vessel in a format that is as easy to use as a mobile device.

“During operations, decision making by the crew has to be quick, despite them being under pressure, so any information has to be clear and relevant to each particular stage of the operation,” explains Damen’s Jeffrey Jacobs, Technical Manager Tugs. “At the same time the ease of operating the system requires an intuitive and simple interaction. The HMI covers the full integrated class-approved Alarm, Monitoring and Control system and can be accessed from the wheelhouse control station, on the main deck and in the switchboard rooms of the tugs. The system is also future-ready having been designed to accept additional applications on multiple devices at a later stage.”

The #UXDA19 expert jury nominated 51 projects from over 20 countries to participate in the UX Design Awards 2019. From those it selected ten winners based in two days of thorough testing and intensive deliberation. In making the award to Damen, the jury stated that: “the Tugboat Alarm, Monitoring and Control System stands out for its innovative visual design and user-centered development process, especially in the context of the maritime industry. The system balances visual material and data well. Being both context and role-sensitive, it is a flawless example of a tailor-made approach that meets the requirements of different user groups, including captains and engineers.”

The awards will be presented during a gala ceremony taking place at the global technology show IFA in Berlin on 6 September 2019. Damen will also be demonstrating the system to the public as part of a special exhibition at the show.

Users worldwide now have the opportunity to vote for their favorite solutions. Voting for the audience prize “UX Design Award | Public Choice” opened on 20 August and continues until 31 October 2019 on the UX Design Awards website. The winner of the audience prize will be announced in November 2019.

Navis, a part ofCargotec Corporation and provider of operational technologies and services that unlock greater performance and efficiency for the world’s leading terminal operators, and the Port of Tanjung Pelepas (PTP) announced that the terminal has gone live with the Navis N4 TOS to help them scale as demand at the terminal grows.

PTP, a joint venture between MMC Group and APM Terminals, is Malaysia’s most advanced container terminal, with capacity to handle up to 12.5 million TEUs annually. PTP is situated on the eastern side of the mouth of the Pulai River in South-West Johor, mere 45 minutes from the confluence of the world’s busiest shipping lanes. PTP has 14 linear berths totaling 5.04 km. The terminal is equipped with 58 Super Post Panamax cranes, 16 of which have a 24-box outreach catering for the next generation of Triple E size vessels. These cranes also have twin-lift capability to further enhance productivity. PTP’s current average berth productivity for mainliner vessels stands at 100 moves per hour minimum.

To meet the future expected volume growth, PTP has upgraded its TOS to Navis N4 which provides improved performance and scalability.  With Navis N4 in operation, PTP has again broken the record for vessel utilization after the MSC Gulsun, the largest container ship in the world, departed with 19,574 TEU in July 2019. This milestone means PTP has broken the record three times in a row and has become the first port in the world to set back-to-back records for container vessel utilization.

“I have personally been involved in many ‘go lives’, but never one of this size and scale and also never one that has gone so well in so many areas, including change management, adoption of new processes and frontline technology. Without a doubt, the ownership of this project – from the shareholder level to the hatch clerk front line and everybody in between – has been second to none. This is the result of a lot of hard work from many people, both onsite and globally. Thanks to our great foundation and Navis’ second to none commitment to this project’s success, we have done what many thought was impossible, by migrating one of the single biggest facilities in the world with no unplanned impact to our landside or waterside customers,” said Joe Schofield, COO, PTP.

“The implementation of Navis N4 has been years in planning and preparation. With the support of teams from PTP, Navis, MMC, APM Terminals and other vendors, N4 was successfully implemented on time and with no unplanned disruption to daily port operations. We would like to congratulate PTP on the successful implementation of N4, once again setting a new utilization record.  A note of special gratitude for making the implementation such a success goes to Marco Neelsen, CEO PTP, Joe Schofield, COO PTP, and Gaurav Sharma, CIO PTP, for their excellent leadership during the planning & implementation,” said Simon Doughty, Vice President and General Manager, Asia-Pacific, Navis.

As a part of its cooperative agreement with the U.S. Department of Transportation Maritime Administration (MARAD), Boston-based Sea Machines Robotics announces that it has successfully demonstrated its autonomous systems in action on board a Kvichak Marco skimmer boat during events held along the Portland harbor earlier today.

Sea Machines’ technology opens a new era of capability for the marine industry, and today the company demonstrated its ability to increase the safety, productivity, and predictability of response for marine oil-spill operations.

The on-water demonstrations took place aboard the world’s first autonomous spill response vessel – a Vigor/Kvichak Marine Industries-built skimmer boat, owned by Marine Spill Response Corp. (MSRC) – before a live audience of MARAD, government, naval, international, environmental and industry representatives.

From a shoreside location at Portland Yacht Services, a Sea Machines operator commanded the SM300-equipped skimmer boat to perform the following capabilities:

• Remote autonomous control from an onshore location or secondary vessel,
• ENC-based mission planning,
• Autonomous waypoint tracking,
• Autonomous grid line tracking,
• Collaborative autonomy for multi-vessel operations, and
• Wireless remote payload control to deploy on-board boom, skimmer belt and other response equipment.

Additionally, Sea Machines discussed how to operate the skimmer in an unmanned autonomous mode, which enables operators to respond to spill events 24/7 depending on recovery conditions, even when crews are restricted. These configurations also reduce or eliminate exposure of crewmembers to challenging sea and weather, toxic fumes and other safety hazards.

“Our operation of the world’s first autonomous, remote-commanded spill-response vessel is yet another significant industry first for Sea Machines,” said Michael G. Johnson, founder and CEO, Sea Machines (shown speaking, above). “But even more important is the fact that we’ve proven that our technology can be applied to the marine spill response industry – as well as other marine sectors – to protect the health and lives of mariners responding to spills. We are proud to support MSRC’s mission of response preparedness and to work alongside MARAD for these important demonstrations.”

“MSRC is excited to work with Sea Machines on this new technology. The safety of our personnel is the most important consideration in any response. Autonomous technology enhances safe operations,” said John Swift, vice president, MSRC.

“This is the future of the maritime industry. It’s safer, it’s faster, it’s more cost-effective,” said Richard Balzano, deputy administrator, MARAD (shown operating the Sea Machines remote control, above). “This technology is here and it will make you a believer. We are here because we want to help the maritime industry evolve. It’s about safety, the environment and reducing risk on the water.”

Sea Machines’ SM Series of products, which includes the SM300 and SM200, provides marine operators a new era of task-driven, computer-guided vessel control, bringing advanced autonomy within reach for small- and large-scale operations. SM products can be installed aboard existing or new-build commercial vessels with return on investment typically seen within a year. Sea Machines is also a leading developer of advanced perception and navigation assistance technology for a range of vessel types, including container ships. The company is currently testing its perception and situational awareness technology aboard one of A.P. Moller-Maersk’s new-build ice-class container ships.

In August 2018, Sea Machines demonstrated the capabilities of its SM300 product aboard the world’s first autonomous-command, remote-controlled fireboat, owned by TUCO Marine, during the Maritime Kulturdage event, in Korsør, Denmark.