SSG No 4 - Shipgaz

(CALDOVREP) onto their screen, we had
to come up with a sophisticated management
system.”
Highly manipulatable
Brought together within CNIS are data
from radar, Automatic Identification Systems
(AIS) and VHF radio direction finders.
These are displayed with S-57 standard
electronic chart features in a single highly
manipulatable system, which includes predictive
plotting. The information is presented
on an array of three large LCD
screens, which are visible even when the
low winter sun is streaming in through the
control-room windows.
The only data still independent of the
Norcontrol IT system are tidal information
and weather conditions. There is in theory
no reason why these data could not also be
fed in. There is however a sense, similar to
that to be found on high technology
bridges, that the experienced Coast Guard
or mariner (the former are often though
not exclusively the latter) wants to maintain
a physical hold over some element of
judgement.
In Dover CNIS, tidal data sits on a
stand-alone system and Watch Officers use
their experience to calculate the impact of
wind and tide on shipping movements that
may be causing concern.
Cannot act to control movements
Concern however is just about all that can
be caused at Dover CNIS and the French
Coast Guard station at Cap Gris Nez. This
is because despite being responsible for the
safety of traffic separation in the world’s
most crowded shipping lane, neither one
organisation has the power to take active
control of movements. CNIS puts out
hourly VHF information broadcasts, which
go to half hourly in bad visibility. One London
consultant, who has worked worldwide
with Coast Guard organisations, comments:
“There is an apparent absurdity here. On
a day-to-day basis all that they can provide
is information to vessels passing through.
They can at best suggest course changes,
but they have no universal power to regulate
traffic. In the event of a major catastrophe
blocking one of the through channels,
the French and British would obviously
have to organise a temporary traffic system,
even if they were not strictly entitled to do
it. However even then, there would be no
obligation on any master to take any
notice of the new arrangements.”
Mike Toogood asserts that the authorities
on both sides of the channel are content
with the status quo. To regulate traffic separation
through the Channel as it is done
into ports, would demand a far larger supervisory
effort and the resources to enforce
instructions that were being ignored.
As it is, Dover CNIS has a fixed wing
Britten-Norman Islander aircraft, able to
identify vessel names in the dark, which it
can call up from Manston in Kent and a
tug on charter to the Coast guard. There
are generally two reasons for Dover CNIS
to mobilise such resources; when a vessel
fails to make the mandatory report when
passing into the Channel, and when it
behaves in a dangerous manner.
Shortly before SSG’s visit to Langdon
Battery, the MCA tug had been sent out to
a ship that was straying in and out of the
inshore navigation area, apparently unsure
of the location of the SW channel. When
watch officers at Dover CNIS were unable
to raise the vessel on either Channel 16 or
11, the tug was sent to intercept it. Toogood
says that on that occasion no action
was taken against the vessel’s master. For
serious breaches of regulations, such as vessels
with faulty AIS transponders or navigated
in a dangerous manner in breach of
COLREGS, a report is sent to MCA headquarters
at Southampton. This will include
a copy of the digital record of the vessel’s
movements in relation to other traffic.
Hazardous navigation
One matter of continuing concern to the
authorities is the speed of vessels in fog.
Commercial pressures sometimes appear to
IT & COMMUNICATIONS
Dover CNIS’s Langdon Battery site once defended against invasion. Today it’s high technology
that defends against danger and disaster in the Dover Strait.
be militating against safe navigation. An
experienced cross-Channel ferry master has
expressed particular concern about movements
of ULCC’s within the narrow deepwater
channel, which falls mostly within
the British-monitored southwest lane.
“These behemoths, even at speed, are
not hugely manoeuvrable. The nightmare
on a Channel crossing is that you have
three or four of them passing each other
and you have to work out where to find a
safe way. It is down to you. In any sort of
emergency, they could not do much about
their course and heading, even if they tried.
But then I take the view, sometimes forgotten
by younger deck officers, that if it is
absolutely necessary, I can always stop.”
The last serious collision, between the
Dutch Aquamarine and MV Ash in October
2001, was actually caused by an officer
more interested in looking at his radar
screen than out the bridge window, which
caused his vessel to ram the stern of the
other.
Few procecutions
“By its nature most of the traffic passing
down the SW channel is not bound for a
UK port”, says Toogood. “If a rule-breaker
is actually UK bound, then of course
action will be taken against the master as
soon as he docks. If the next port of call is
another EU port, then we will also pass on
details of the offence for action to be taken
at that location. A non-working transponder,
for instance, would in the EU normally
result in that vessel being detained in
port until it was fixed. Normally however
we will forward details of the infringement
SCANDINAVIAN SHIPPING GAZETTE • FEBRUARY 23, 2007 23