By Nicole Catherine Taylor*, Gaël Porée, Maxime Albouy, Henrique Gaspar*, Anriëtte Bekker and Karel Kruger ~ May 2024
Affiliations: Sound and Vibration Research Group at Stellenbosch University, Ship Design and Operation Lab at NTNU in Ålesund
Corresponding Authors*: nctaylor@sun.ac.za, henrique.gaspar@ntnu.no
Welcome to a demonstration of a traversal through the Southern Ocean on South Africa's Polar Supply and Research Vessel, the SA Agulhas II. This will be no ordinary voyage. It will be from the perspective of Vessel 4.0, the digital twin for the SA Agulhas II, as it monitored the ship motion and passenger well-being during the Southern oCean seAsonaL Experiment (SCALE) Winter Cruise of 2022.
Imagine yourself in a room in a large building, which is much like being in a room on a ship - a sturdy floating platform in the port. Then, around midnight on 11 July, the vibration of the engine starts feeling tangible through your feet. The SA Agulhas II departs from the Port of Cape Town, South Africa, heading in a South-Westerly direction. The goal is to head due South to conduct research in the marginal ice zone, enduring the notorious swells of the Southern Ocean and navigating through ice-infested waters. You can view the ship track through the scientific data system dashboard from the leisure of the passenger dining saloon along the journey, similar to that shown below.
More information about the SA Agulhas II is available around the ship on posters and dashboards in the laboratories or Bridge, where the navigational officers control the ship. Information about the SA Agulhas II is also managed by Vessel 4.0, as shown below.
Name:
Length:
Length:
Width:
Call sign:
Click here to read more about the SA Agulhas IIAs you are monitoring the dashboard, you may notice that there is no data available about the passenger well-being on the dashboards to monitor ship operation. This may seem trivial now, because you feel fine. But a storm is on the rise along the planned ship track. Immediately as the ship encounters the larger swells, the vibration of the onboard machinery becomes silenced by the evident motion of the ship. A video captured by one of the passengers is shown below, alongside the acceleration measurements recorded by a full-scale sensor network installed on board.
Suddenly, you are more aware of your stomach and nausea clenching your throat, sweat in your palms and your palour turning white. You are motion sick. You retreat to lay down in your cabin. However, no one else knows where you are or that you feel dreadful. How will you communicate this to your work colleagues in your state of despair, especially if the internet connection drops in the storm?
Mariner 4.0 - a human digital twin for seafarers that helps monitor the well-being of passengers comes to your aid. The Vessel 4.0 pioneers human-centered digital developments by interacting with the Mariner 4.0 for each passenger on board. You can provide your Mariner 4.0 with your location and state of motion sickness - saying where you are and how ill you feel. This information can be relayed to the necessary people through data visualisation, such as shown below.
Number of Occupants:
Average Age:
Vomiting Incidence:
Timestamp:
Click on an occupant's location marker to view their information.
Timestamp:
Mariner ID: No occupant selected yet...
Age: No occupant selected yet...
Vomiting Incidence: No occupant selected yet...
Motion Sickness Incidence: No occupant selected yet...
Location: No occupant selected yet...
Data visualised in this way can be extremely informative. The number of illness ratings that are greater than 0 and large percentage of motion sickness incidence mean that everyone on board is feeling some degree of motion sickness. Fortunately, noone is motion sick to the severity of vomiting, indicated by the vomiting incidence. The Vessel 4.0 and Mariner 4.0's work together to estimate the illness ratings from sensor readings by the full-scale sensor network, which can be compared to the illness ratings provided by passengers. Using data like this, the doctor could be notified to come help you and see where you are based on your last known location or the navigational officers can try maneuver the ship accordingly if they receive the information that the ship motion is degrading occupant well-being. This kind of digitised data has never before been available during ship operation, making Vessel 4.0 and Mariner 4.0 a novel contribution to the shipping industry, working towards improving human task performance and well-being.