Tag: ENCs

The Admiralty team has recently returned from Asia where our ECDIS experts presented the ‘Are you ready for the new ECDIS regulations?’ workshops.

Captain Paul Hailwood spoke to 85 delegates in Taipei who seemed well informed of the mandatory carriage of ECDIS and its requirements. However, feedback from the workshops suggested that Taiwanese shipping companies are still in the early stages of their transition to digital navigation, in comparison to their European counterparts. Many attendees were particularly interested in hearing about the cost effectiveness of implementing ECDIS on board; a key concern for the region’s maritime industry.

Ian Moncrieff CBE, Chief Executive, UKHO, explains why Admiralty has developed a series of training tools to help seagoers operate safely with ECDIS

If the maritime industry is to realise the full benefits of ECDIS, it is essential that bridge watchkeepers are properly trained to be confident and proficient in planning and conducting navigation with ENCs on ECDIS and back of bridge systems.

It’s been an eventful voyage through the nine stages towards ECDIS compliance. But having navigated using the waypoints provided by Admiralty, the passage should have been smooth, if not without some challenges along the way.

As the journey has progressed, Admiralty has supported the process with a programme of workshops around the world, bringing the nine stages to life and helping shipowners, managers, superintendents and navigators understand what the changes will mean for them and how they can prepare.

The Admiralty team has just returned from Posidonia in Athens, where our ECDIS expert, Captain Paul Hailwood, presented the ‘Are you ready for the new ECDIS regulations?’ workshop to nearly 100 delegates. Feedback was extremely positive and we added in two extra sessions to the schedule to meet demand.

Regular blog readers will know that the workshop is designed to help shipping companies prepare for ECDIS compliance. It explains the process in nine clear stages, from identifying key SOLAS compliance dates through to training, risk assessment and the actual transition to electronic navigational charts (ENCs).

We’re nearing the end of our series looking at each of the 9 stages in Admiralty’s guide for getting ready for the new ECDIS regulations

The eighth stage of ECDIS transition is the transition itself, when all the training, procedures, installation and approvals come together onboard ship. From here, there is no turning back but our ECDIS expert Paul Hailwood says the process to date should mean that the company and the ships are prepared for the changeover.

Admiralty ran a series of ‘Are you ready for the ECDIS regulations?’ workshops at Sea Japan. Following the workshops, the Future of Navigation blog caught up with some of the attendees, including Captain Noboru Shiomoto from one of Japan’s largest shipping companies, NYK. We discussed the company’s strategy for installing and operating ECDIS.

NYK Line has accumulated a decade of experience in digital navigation, having installed its first shipboard systems in 2002, according to the manager of its Marine Technical Team, Noboru Shiomoto.

Earlier this year we talked to UKHO’s Hugh Phillips about the problems identified by the International Hydrographic Bureau (IHB) whereby some, especially older, ECDIS were subject to software anomalies, which might result in some navigation data not displaying correctly.

The IHB developed and issued a check dataset in late 2011 to alert mariners to these problems and last month it issued a further circular advising that of about 500 responses received, only one third of ECDIS units tested functioned completely as expected.

Next in our series of posts looking at the 9 stages of preparation for ECDIS (from Admiralty’s ECDIS guide) we turn to Chart Supply and the importance of having a simple and reliable solution for managing and maintaining ENCs.

Moving from paper charts to digital navigation is not just a process of swapping one source of content for another. Certainly, owners and operators need to understand the necessity of sailing on official ENCs to be ECDIS-compliant, but the digital transition means ensuring that chart management is adapted to reflect the new environment.

The number of ports covered by the Admiralty Vector Chart Service now exceeds 3,000. As of week commencing 15 April, Admiralty offers Electronic Navigational Charts (ENCs) for 3008 ports, including 755 of the world’s top 800 ports, and a further 964 of ports ranked 801 – 2000.

ENCs for nearly 250 of these ports are only available from the Admiralty Vector Chart Service, including 82 ports in Indonesia, 37 ports in Malaysia, 17 ports in Thailand and 16 ports in the Philippines.

By now shipowners and managers should be well into the swing of their digital transition. That’s not to say all is completely plain sailing but it should be obvious that this is a process which cascades naturally from one topic to the next.

Managing bridge procedures might seem more of a leap than a simple jump and at first sight it looks like a daunting task. But in fact much of what ECDIS (Electronic Chart Display and Information System) users need to know is known already – what the ship and shore alike have to do is demonstrate that they have a grasp on the subject.