Can anyone on this forum, with a modicum of experience, please explain to me the advantages of remote pilotage because I well understand all the pitfalls.
Not falling off the ship and then getting run over by the pilot boat? My college roommate lost his father, a Bay pilot, that way 
Other than that I cannot think of one.
YS,
It
This is a current partial screenshot of global Marine Traffic…….98% of these vessels will employ a Pilot and the majority of these professionals ascend and descend Pilot ladders in all weather conditions and sea states. The percentage of Marine Pilot deaths as compared to tasks undertaken is infinitesimal. IMO have just introduced further strategies to improve ladder safety.
Let us get real about this. Air India, via an incident under current investigation, have 260 fatalities on their books.
This is change for the sake of change. An absolute nonsense.
I agree, but if you HAD to think of one thing, that would be it.
According to the linked article in the OP the program is for “transits that do not require compulsory pilotage under current regulations.” and “is expected to be relevant for up to 10 per cent of DanPilot’s current operations”.
So what is being discussed is operations at the margin. Singapore Straits comes to mind, as does the English Channel. In both places pilotage is not compulsory. In the English Channel channel pilots are available whereas in Singapore there are not.
There’s also the common practice in some ports of the pilot boarding and disembarking the ship inside during bad weather.
KC,
Rest assured, there are organisations with an agenda to adopt remote Pilotage within compulsory Pilotage ports. It has been on the table for a while now. Tugs would be fitted with very accurate and RTK corrected TPU’s to determine berth closing speeds and aspect approach angles etc and the remote control centre would receive feed off the TPU’s as a control backup……and what is being gained? We are no longer putting a Pilot aboard via a rope ladder as a means of addressing this “massive fatality rate” …….
Something similar to the push, within the aviation sector, to rid passenger airliners of those pesky Pilots up the front.
@244 @Ausmariner Again, IMO this is a question of when, not if. Technology changes stuff, even in our industry -that moves very slowly. Sensors will improve, I can even see some ports installing their own, that are independent of the ships. How much harder is it to have a self driven taxi navigate downtown Austin at rush hour - than have a ship with a master mariner on board, with the aide of a pilot ashore navigate a 1,000 ft channel with 1 slow turn in it ?
As others have said, their are operations, and places where this will not work, but there are places where it will. There is tension in many ports of the world between the users of the port and the pilots, mostly around pilotage fees. At some point if the technology is there, these users of the ports will press for something like this.
Pilot organizations where this will be tried will wave the safety flag, and up their political contributions to the boards that give them their monopoly. This will slow this down. But technology is very very hard to stop.
TT,
So we are still employing a Pilot to undertake the remote Pilotage and therefore this will continue to incur levied charges along with other port charges such as a Navigation Services Charge. My question to you is….what is being gained by taking the Pilot off the vessel?
There is nothing here that says that the “remote” pilot fee would not be at some discount to the usual fee. Some pilot organizations may be able to reduce the number, and or the capabilities of their pilot boats. Organizations may be able to reduce their manpower. If, and I think there are, efficiencies to be gained here, rates may have to reflect those.
Along with obvious one of not having to board offshore in some areas.
There have been 32 Marine Pilot fatalities in the last 18 years which equates to 1.8 fatalities per year covering 1,500,000 Pilotage acts for a collective 8360 Marine Pilots and this is less than half the fatality rate of aviation Pilots who do not climb ladders.
Should we discuss a comparative rate of 43,000 pa road fatalities in the USA alone which over 18 years equates to a total of 774,000 souls as opposed to 32.
This proposed initiative is partially about costs, more about control and change for the sake of change. It has little relevance to the issue of Pilot safety and ladders. The figures do not stack up.
What!! Absolutely not. In fact I think we need to charge more because of cybersecurity or something…
Now that is a well trained pilot !!!
That could the first and only time I have seen a pilot talk about how safe it is to board ships at sea.
I am just enumerating the actual figures which speak for themselves. Not at any point did I say it was safe. Driving your motor vehicle is not safe, flying in a commercial airliner is not safe……very few undertakings in our modern existence can be deemed to be safe.
Over 22 years and well in excess of 5000 Pilotage acts, I estimate that I ascended/descended approximately 3500 ladders in some fairly extreme sea states. The balance was done via helicopter transfer. In that time, my colleagues completed 115,000 Pilotage acts in total which resulted in one Pilot falling 2 metres back onto the Pilot cutter owing to fatigue. Not a single fatality.
Those are the facts and those are the figures.
You keep talking stats like that and you are going to get kicked out of the world wide pilot union.
Most of the stuff I have seen on it made me believe it was an inherently dangerous task that only a few, select, extraordinary people would even risk - and then only due to their deep dedication to the safety of the port.
(sarcasm font)
Just to be serious for a second - I have a long and deep respect for almost every pilot organization I have worked with over the years. Serious and well trained professionals doing an important job.
Considering that in nearly all air transport fatal accidents there are two pilots sitting next to each other and both arrive at the accident scene at the same instant, maybe you should recalculate your math.
Civil aviation includes private pilots, airshow pilots, and ultralight airplane pilots in addition to commercial air carrier pilots. If you want to compare apples to oranges you are going to have to include fishermen, yachties, sailboaters, and jet ski drivers in your stats.
Why does any industry automate? Technology advances, and people cost money no matter how low the accident rate. Sure you may start by removing one person, and you say there’s no savings there. But that one becomes many. Start with remote pilotage then go to fully AI pilotage. Then when you don’t need a pilot, you don’t need a pilot boat. No pilot boat crew. No pilot office and association. Not tomorrow for sure, but the future rolls on no matter how important you think your role is, just ask a flight engineer from the 40s.
You can say that nothing can replace the physical presence of the pilot with their knowledge and experience, reacting to what they see and feel in real time. But I see space shuttles descending from space and landing on a postage stamp of a moving vessel in the middle of the sea, all accomplished by computer. You and your fellow pilots can share experience and lessons learned in meetings. An AI pilotage program could in theory learn everything about every ship presently being piloted in real time, and could be taught every vessel parameter and know it without having to glance at a pilot card.
You are not wrong, there’s no system that can do your job as well as you can right now, but it would be foolish to believe that the current pace of AI technology can’t do it better, safer, and more consistently and efficiently in the future.