Carnival Corporation is to integrate Sea Traffic Management (STM) data exchange processes across its entire fleet, allowing its vessels to exchange information with industry stakeholders using standardised data formats and interfaces.
The move comes after Costa Crociere, part of Carnival Corporation, had previously integrated its Costa and Aida ships with the system and successfully verified the effectiveness of operations using STM.
Costa developed STM support as part of its Fleet Operation Centre software Neptune, adding new functionality to allow interaction with other STM services, ports and shore centre operators. The software can also evaluate voyage optimisation suggestions received by shore centres through the STM maritime digital infrastructure.
As part of the setup Carnival ships can also share their voyage plans automatically with Vessel Traffic Services along their routes.
“With our Fleet Operation Centres we have further increased safety on board our ships and with STM we can use the solution to share voyage plans with all other STM-enabled services, such as route optimisation and Vessel Traffic Services, to create a shared situational awareness,” said Franco Caraffi, IT Director at Carnival Maritime.
The EU-funded STM Validation project, which concluded on June 30, had set a goal of providing STM functionality to 300 ships to prove the viability of its data exchange concepts. With the entire Carnival fleet coming on board the number of vessels involved has now come close to 400 ships.
The other ships involved in the programme have been equipped with STM-enabled systems by Wärtsilä, Furuno and Adveto, as an integrated part of their ECDIS.
“Carnival’s advanced Fleet Operation Centre is a good example of how a proprietary ecosystem can be connected to interact with external services via STM. Costa´s contributions in bringing STM forward are most valuable to the project and to the maritime industry at large,” said STM testbed manager Björn Andreasson.
