Remarks on the further development of an integrated navigation system

According to the recommendation of the IMO Resolution MSC.252(83), “Adoption of the revised performance standards for integrated navigation system (INS)”, the INS is introduced in order to enhance navigational safety by providing integrated and augmented functions to avoid geographic, traffic and environmental hazards. Its main task is to provide ‘added value’ for the officer of the watch (OOW), ship’s captain and pilot, to plan, monitor or control the navigational safety and progress of the ship. The system should support navigational safety by combining, processing and evaluating inputs from different connected sensors and sources to provide information, giving timely warnings of dangerous situations, system failures and degradation of the integrity of delivered and presented information. An INS is defined as such if workstations provide multifunctional displays integrating at least the following navigational tasks (functions): route monitoring, collision avoidance and alert management. The output data contains a description of the subsystems and devices included in the INS, and the principles of their cooperation and presentation of data, but it does not present recommendations for interfacing the INS with the ship’s radio communications equipment or standardised rules of operation by the user and presentation of information. These restrictions limit the possibilities of using this system in e-navigation. This paper identifies the importance of these limitations with respect to the need for further development of INSs, and presents proposals to solve this problem.