Wärtsilä successfully tests remote control ship operating capability

The technology group Wärtsilä has taken a further important step towards developing its Smart Marine capabilities by successfully testing the remote control of ship operations, the company said in its press release. The testing, which involved driving the vessel through a sequence of manoeuvres using a combination of Dynamic Positioning (DP) and manual joystick control, was carried out on August 21 off the North Sea coast of Scotland in collaboration with Gulfmark Offshore, the U.S. based operator who provided the vessel for the project. Although the test vessel was in the North Sea, the remote control navigating was carried out from the Wärtsilä office located in San Diego, California, 8000 km (5000 miles) away.
 
Wärtsilä's Dynamic Positioning unit developed remote control capabilities in the early part of 2016, but this was the first test carried out on an offshore vessel. The vessel, the 'Highland Chieftain' is an 80 metre platform supply vessel already fitted with a Wärtsilä Nacos Platinum package for Navigation, Automation and Dynamic Positioning systems, as well as a Wärtsilä drives package. For the test, additional software was temporarily added to the DP system in order to route data over the vessel's satellite link to the onshore work station in California.
 
Most importantly, the Wärtsilä testing was carried out using standard bandwidth onboard satellite communication. No land-based technology was used for the communications between the vessel and the remote operator work station. The retrofitting of the DP software was completed within just 30 hours and with minimal inconvenience, thanks to Wärtsilä's modular and easily upgradable system.
 
The successful test was conducted over an almost 4 hour period during which time the vessel was driven through a series of manoeuvres at both high and low speeds. All the test procedures carried out went as planned.
 
It is anticipated that Wärtsilä's development of successful remote access to ships will also enable virtual service solutions to customers needing tuning or testing of their DP systems. Furthermore, this solution will be used for other pilot projects, such as automated docking procedures.
 
Wärtsilä has earlier supplied three of Gulfmark Offshore's 'Highland series' vessels with various products, systems and solutions, as well as DP systems to several other vessel series within the company's fleet.