Hydrographic Society Benelux

Workshop on Technical Developments During ­Europort

As a side-event to Europort 2013, the Hydrographic Society Benelux organised a workshop matching the theme of the event ‘Pioneers in Maritime Technology’.

The event was opened by Oystein Aasbo of Kongsberg Maritime Norway, giving a fascinating insight into new operational features of AUVs and what the future might bring. He predicted that some tasks such as Inspection, Maintenance and Repair, and positioning seismic bottom nodes, now often carried out using ROVs, could be performed by AUVs. He also showed the new Kongsberg Munin AUV and its features.

Martin de Kievit of Trimble, the Netherlands, followed in his steps and discussed the growing number of GNSS satellites and their constellations. From the receiver manufacturer’s perspective, more signals need to be addressed, which can be a challenge given the time and quantity as the number of positioning satellites increases to 75.

Yann Casamajou of iXBlue showed the improvement DP-PHINS can bring compared to PHINS, also taking into account the signal sources this equipment can handle, which is normally not associated with DP like Doppler Velocity Logs (DVL). The positioning data are smoother, more accurate and updated at a higher rate leading to fuel saving and reduced wear and tear on the DP system components.

After the break, Ellen Stuifbergen of Teledyne Reson led the participants into the world of the latest SeaBat multibeam systems and their applications. One of them, auto-detection and tracking of pipelines improves the data acquisition and processing for further analysis. In addition, the real-time display of the water column data can be of interest to hydrographic surveyors.

A remotely controlled survey boat can be a solution in survey areas that are difficult to access, or in areas where it can be dangerous to work. Sander Terwee of Geometius presented the Z-Boat, which can be launched by two surveyors and can work in various smaller or very shallow locations.

The delegates concluded their workshop during the networking social kindly sponsored by Kongsberg Maritime, where they had time to catch up with the latest developments and approach the speakers for further questions.

The next workshop is scheduled for 11 December 2013 starting at 1pm. The topic of this workshop will be: A critical look at ECDIS. Further details are available on the website of the Hydrographic Society Benelux.