Effective ship domain – Impact of ship size and speed
Z. Pietrzykowski, M. Wielgosz
Abstract
The ship domain is a concept commonly proposed as a safety assessment criterion in planning collision avoidance manoeuvres of a ship or its safe route. The work presents authors’ methods for determining an effective ship domain based on tests using Electronic Chart Display and Information System (ECDIS) simulator. The tests were conducted on non-autonomous real time models of ships steered by expert navigators. Domains were determined for ships of different sizes and speeds. The ship domain was approximated to an ellipse. The study covered absolute and relative domains, the latter defined in ship length units. The dependence of the domain shape and size on ship size and speed has been analysed and described. The formulated analytical relationships enable us to determine the domain of a ship varying in size and speed.