In the modern world, the most attention in the segment of unmanned vehicles is paid to cars, but in fact, work is going on in many different areas. For example, two days ago, on January 17, as part of the Smart Coastal Ferry project, a huge 222-meter ferry, created by Shin Nihonkai Ferry and Mitsubishi Shipbuilding, made a full-fledged voyage across the Sea of Japan without human assistance, covering a total of 240 kilometers and even made docking with the port in automatic mode. For the foreseeable future, such ferries will operate on a permanent basis, carrying out a lot of freight traffic.
It is worth noting that earlier this ship, within the framework of the program established by the non-profit organization The Nippon Foundation, has already repeatedly passed along this route, but earlier in these scenarios the ship was still controlled by a person. Accordingly, in the process of passing the flights, the navigation system of the ship, created by Mitsubishi Shipbuilding, collected all the necessary data about the route, so that, as a result, the ferry developers could start the flight already in automatic mode. Of course, a 7-hour flight (the ship was moving at a speed of 26 knots – 48 km / h) can hardly be called something incredible, but this is just the beginning of work in this direction.
In order to provide autonomous control on such an impressive ship, the authors of the program installed a whole set of various infrared cameras on the ship’s hull, which were responsible for detecting other ships even in poor visibility conditions. In addition, a GPS navigation system, a system for monitoring engines and smooth operation, as well as an advanced mechanism for automatic mooring were installed. The last task is quite difficult even for a person, but on this ship it was performed exclusively by automation. And, fortunately, the flight was absolutely successful – now the Smart Coastal Ferry project is planned to be developed and scaled up.
In addition, representatives of Mitsubishi Shipbuilding said that these technologies should significantly increase safety at sea, as automation eliminates the human factor, which most often causes accidents and disasters. And unmanned ships will reduce the need for qualified personnel and reduce the costs of shipping companies.
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