This is such
an obvious application we can be certain to see it become standard
practice. It will also cause our ice
predictive capabilities to be nicely polished.
Add in hovercraft ice breaking technology and the Arctic looks a lot
less challenging for heavy shipping.
As I have
posted in the past, an Asian – Arctic - Passage – Atlantic is likely feasible
for 500,000 ton nuclear powered hovercraft.
Such a craft would make over eighty kilometers per hour in the open sea
and possible as much as fifty kph over passable ice. Such a service would hammer the long haul
container trade.
We are likely
decades away from that happening though.
Shipping
firm first to use drones to navigate Arctic ice
Published April 02, 2014
It turns out that all the Titanic needed was a drone.
A Montreal-based shipping company has become the first in the
world to use drones to scout out ice hazards as its freighters navigate through
the waters of the Arctic.
The company, Fednav, has found the drones, or unmanned aerial vehicles,
are able to transmit crucial information back to the wheelhouse, allowing ship
captains to thread their way through frozen waters and dodge icebergs, like the
one that sank the iconic ship more than a century ago.
“The use of UAVs is proving to be extremely beneficial to
identify many ice features that should be avoided ahead of the vessel, as well
as identifying open water leads to improve voyage efficiency,” Thomas Paterson,
Fednav senior vice president said in a statement. “In addition, the deployment
of drones fitted with top-quality cameras, gives the ice navigator another
useful aid when making important decisions while transiting heavy ice regimes,
and in turn, improved safe navigation."
One of Fednav’s icebreakers, the Umiak I, recently used drones
to scout ahead of the ship while it was traveling through the icy waters of the
Labrador Coast off Canada, the company said.
The company released a video showing drones taking off from the
deck and reporting back on the path ahead.
Fednav said Enfotec, a subsidiary of the company, is helping it
with the drone operations.
No comments:
Post a Comment