Verification of the AIS service availability model based on dynamic data streams recorded from three receiving stations in the Polish coastal area

Abstract

The reliability aspects of the operation of radio navigation systems constitute a crucial element for the safety of maritime navigation.. Technological progress in ship traffic monitoring is achieved through the design of ship systems and shore infrastructure equipped with Automatic Identification System (AIS) devices. One of the issues with AIS operation is the limited availability of the service in the form of data streams with an extended data age recorded on the receiving side. Another problem is the emission and reception by ships of incomplete positional reports without navigational parameters. Such situations render the system operationally unfit in terms of processed information. Therefore, it is essential to investigate the operational characteristics of radio navigation systems and develop tools to monitor the AIS service status on the receiving side. This article presents the development of a model for the availability of an AIS for vessels based on the determined mean time of the occurrence of incomplete navigation parameter values in AIS messages and the results of research in the domain of time and frequency using a mathematical method of the Fast Fourier Transform (FFT). The study results refer to six basic navigation parameters and show a varying service availability factor for the navigation parameters under study, i.e. the latitude (LAT), longitude (LON), speed over ground (SOG), course over ground (COG), heading (HDT), and the rate of turn (ROT). The data recorded by three receiving AIS stations on the Polish coast, i.e. PLKOL, PLSZZ, and PLSWI, were used as a key source of practical knowledge on the limitations of the AIS service availability. The experiment observed interruptions in the regular transmission of data from navigation equipment in the AIS service operational zone. As a result, the functional relationship was described based on the spectral analysis of the frequency of occurrence of times between the service repair (Time To Repair, TTR), and the model was proposed to be applied to the study of other variables. The presented model is a tool that allows for improving the monitoring of vessel traffic in terms of reliability, which directly affects the improvement of maritime traffic safety.

Keywords

• automatic identification system
• reliability theory
• fast Fourier transform
• spectral analysis
• digital signal processing