Planning and monitoring on same equipment (2)

Does it encourage "best practice"?

We can and do have equipment with a single display that meets the requirements, but is it advisable? Does it encourage "best practice"? .
A short while ago, the prudent mariner would have an up to date paper chart, be regularly fixing, have an ARPA, AIS, etc., as well as finding plenty of time to look out of the window. This meant that the OOW could assess the traffic (by several methods) and compare it to the position on the chart, to maintain an overview of the potential dangers and options available. All of the information was always available. Plus, being prudent, future passage plans would have been done outside the watch, on paper charts, without affecting the safe navigation of the ship.
Nowadays, on standalone equipment, the OOW has to maintain the watch, with the ENC, radar, AIS, etc., being displayed on the same screen. If you want to use it for anti-collision, you should have it in radar mode, with radar settings, tuning, etc., displayed. If you want to check on your position you should have the relevant ENC, with correct scale, layers, etc. displayed. If you want to use the "look ahead" function that is another selection. Just flicking between the various choices reduces the time for looking out of the window.

RESPONSE

(from ECDIS Ltd)

Assuming that the ECDIS is in the hands of a properly trained operator: It does encourage ‘best practice’ for the simple reason that the ECDIS is able to plot the ship’s position every second rather than fix, DR, EP on a paper chart. Too much information on an ECDIS is as dangerous as too little and so it is up to the operator to ensure that the configuration of the display meets the needs of that specific vessel and the environment that it is operating in. If this is successfully achieved, and the system is properly configured, then the operator has more time to look out of the window knowing that the system will alert him of any dangers to navigation.
A poorly configured system will mean that the operator is spending too much time at the ECDIS (akin to spending too much time at the chart table).

In terms of navigation, fundamentally, nothing has changed. There is still a chart, radar and other navaids to assist the OOW, except you are now able to fuse this information on one screen. This allows far greater spatial awareness than is available with a paper chart. However, I would always recommend caution when doing so, because:

1. Too much information is as dangerous as too little.
2. A potential danger of ECDIS is that the operator can overlay information on ECDIS, but can also overlay information on the radar. This means that the operator may try and fuse too much information between navaids so that the ECDIS becomes the radar and vice versa.
3. Therefore, it is important to keep your navaids as independent as possible. By this I mean that you should not put all your eggs in one basket. If/when ECDIS fails there needs to be a clear distinction between what is the next best navaid to use, normally the radar. The ability to acquire radar contacts on some ECDIS complicates matters.

My advice is – by all means overlay information on the ECDIS, but keep the radar the radar and the ECDIS the ECDIS and know how to quickly get rid of such overlay information if required to de-clutter the display.

However, if you are arguing that too much time is spent ‘fiddling’ with the ECDIS then think of it this way – how much time would you have to spend ‘fiddling’ with the chart, the radar, AIS etc individually? At least with ECDIS it can all be overlaid on a single display without having to frequently check independent displays. As I said, in the right hands this absolutely gives you more time to look out of the window.

ECDIS is only the tool for the operator to use and it is the skill of the operator to get the most out of this equipment. In the past it was the navigator’s skill using a sextant that allowed positional information to be gained. Using this valuable and perhaps sparse information it was then the skill of the navigator to process this information and make an informed judgement. Nowadays, with modern high-tech equipment it is the skill of the operator to configure the system, process a large quantity of information, make an informed judgement and conduct an action. The latter is not necessarily easier than the former as the danger is to be overloaded with information. Therefore, it is all about the importance of proper training, system configuring and robust bridge procedures.