5. Guidelines on ergonomic criteria for bridge equipment and layout
The issue about the subject proposed by Germany at NAV 45 was left to be discussed further.
With the following two things in mind, the TWG prepared the draft Guidelines:
1] taking the portion related to IEC 60945 proposed by IEC into the "Ergonomics" part and the "Human Machine Interface" part, 2] paying attention to the contents of ISO/CD 14612.2 proposed by ISO.
In addition, the scope of ship type of 「not less than 3,000 tons gross tonnage」 was deleted because this is the guide line, not mandatory.
The proposal by TWG that these Guidelines be submitted to MSC73 in order to obtain approval for making these Guidelines into a Circular, was approved at the plenary session.
6. Integrated bridge systems (IBS) operational aspects
Owning to the no paper submitted, the issue was not discussed this time.
At the plenary session, countries were invited to submit proposal documents by next time.
(Note) From the experience of the grounding accident of the "Syria Europe" (a highly automated ship), the government of Finland requested its national committee to develop guidelines for automated ships, i.e. ships employing an integrated bridge system (IBS). And they consulted with Denmark about the guidelines and worked them out. At NAV44 when performance standards for INS were prepared, there was a proposal that "the performance standards for devices are important, but the standardization for the operation and management is equally important, so attention should be paid to Finland's information paper when preparing the requirements for INS, although the paper is not intended to be made into international standards". As the contents are in wide area of operation, training, etc., it was decided that the report should be treated as a circular.
7. Other matters
Prof. Iijima, ISO representative, proposed that standards for peloruses, which are included in a SOLAS V amendment edition, should be developed. And the proposal was recorded.
7.1 Guidelines for the operation of AIS (Automatic Identification Systems)
AIS is required to be operational always during the navigation. However, it has been approved to switch off AIS under special situations, e.g. a situation where a ship is in a area prone to attacks by pirates.
And considering the existence of small craft which are not required to fit an AIS, Japan proposed to additionally state in the subject guidelines that "even in ships required to be installed involuntarily with AIS, it might be switched off at the master's discretion". This addition was accepted.
Connection of AIS with other devices such as radar and ECDIS and consolidation of AIS with an integrated bridge system would improve the effectiveness of AIS, so it was agreed that AIS should be put forward for discussion under the agenda item of IBS.
