Technological challenges for Arctic Shipping

Increased traffic in the Barents Sea requires more and better emergency response The level of communication services in the Arctic region, especially the polar cap, is resources. Safety at sea has three major elements; rescue of people, prevention severely limited due to lack of ground infrastructure and rather poor or non-existent and mitigation of environmental pollution and salvage of properties. All actors in geostationary satellite (GEO) coverage of latitudes beyond ~75°N. Beyond 75°N the Arctic shipping and offshore activities must pay particular attention to escape, main satellite communication system available today is Iridium offering evacuation and rescue of and rig personnel. The petroleum industry is maximum available data rates of 128 kbps, which is not sufficient to meet predicted investing into studies on prevention of oil spill and ways of mitigating capacity demands in the future until the next generation satellite communication consequences if an oil spill occurs. Salvage of property ( or offshore systems are implemented. A new satellite system based on High Elliptical Orbit (HEO) structures) is in most cases done by commercial actors. Due to the lack of satellites and/or hybrid satellite/terrestrial systems are potential technological infrastructure and the harsh environment response operations will be challenging solutions to this identified gap. in Arctic waters.

The Norwegian government is improving SAR capabilities through the procurement of new All Weather Helicopter (AWSARH). The new helicopters of the AW101 type have higher speed and longer endurance than the old Sea King helicopters used by the air force in SAR operations. The first two new AWSAR helicopters will be delivered in 2017 for extensive testing. Endurance requirements from selected bases in demonstrate that a large area will not be covered by helicopters based at mainland. A northern part of the area can be covered by the two upgraded (AS332 L1 Super Puma) SAR helicopters that will be operated from Longyearbyen from 1st April 2014.

UT-512 design

Every year, vessels experience engine failure and drift out of control. The potential consequences of major disasters resulting from vessels drifting close to offshore installations or the coast line include loss of life, environmental contamination and Emergency tow vessel material damage. Software tools used by emergency response organizations have AWSARH "Abeille Bourbon" drifting models for different types of lifesaving equipment (life rafts and lifeboats) as well as some very simplistic models for different classes of merchant vessels. While the mathematical models used in ship-handling simulators are usually At present there are 3 governmental operated towing vessels in Northern tuned to correlate well with service-speed operation, there is a lack of high-quality Norway. None of these vessels are designed as dedicated emergency towing observations of low-speed operations that can be used for model validation. vessels, but are modified offshore vessels. In addition As far as MARINTEK is concerned, the study of drifting characteristics of vessels will vessels are used for emergency towing as was the case for the Kamaro incident normally be related to drifting of disabled vessels in coastal waters and prevention of in 2012. In this situation the towline broke and it was decided to evacuate the grounding incidents. The results of such studies will be used in simulations for crew. Other towing operations in Arctic waters have also resulted in breaking of training personnel involved in emergency towing operations, where learning to handle towing wires, uncontrolled drifting and grounding (MV Seledang Ayu in 2004 and an emergency towing vessel close to a drifting vessel is an important training the drilling rig Kulluk in 2012). To improve emergency towing capability there is objective. Vessel Simulator VeSim, a real-time (or faster) time-domain simulator that an urgent need for design of dedicated Arctic emergency towing vessels combines sea-keeping and maneuvering in a single code is a tool developed by (ETV) and studies of critical cases of how to establish emergency towing MARINTEK. The general model used in VeSim was developed for studies of vessels connection between ETV and vessels/rigs in distress under varying operating at service speed in a seaway, the model thus needs to be adapted for environmental conditions. application to drifting vessels, where the speed over ground is low.

REFERENCES TRACK HEADING 400 30 Gribkovskaia, V., Kvamstad, B. (2013). Arctic fact finding study, MARINTEK. 20 300

Kvamstad, B. (2013). ASK – Arctic satellite communication, MARINTEK. 10 200 A-LEX: a case combined heavy-lift and container shipping from Europe to 0 100 Russia. (2013), MARINTEK, Akvaplan-niva, University of Tromsø. -10

0 -20

SARiNOR, main project proposal (2013). -30 -100

North [m]

Kvamstad, B., Fjørtoft, K., Bekkadal (2012). Future and visions for maritime [deg] Heading -40 -200

safety management in the High North, MARINTEK. -50

-300 Berg, T., Kvamstad, B. (2011). Holistic system for improved safety at sea in -60

1 Norwegian waters (in Norwegian), MARINTEK. -70 -100 0 100 200 300 400 500 600 0 1000 2000 3000 4000

East [m] Time from start of manoeuvre [sec] Victoria Gribkovskaia, Researcher, [email protected] Tor Einar Berg, Principal Research Engineer, [email protected] Marine Technology Centre Ørjan Selvik, Researcher, [email protected] Otto Nielsens veg 10 Beate Kvamstad, Senior Researcher, [email protected] NO-7052 Trondheim, Norway