Home

Provide tools for safe navigation to eliminate deaths, injuries, and environmental and property damage.

The recent rapid expansion of trade, wealth, and recreational opportunities has led to a corresponding growth in vessel traffic and in the potential for accidents. About 3,500 ships are involved annually in accidents on our nation's waterways, and 50%of waterborne cargo contains hazardous materials. Human error is the cause of approximately 80%of those accidents. Educating mariners, pilots, crew, and rescuers about navigational concerns and maintaining a continuing dialogue among marine user groups will facilitate the creation of a safer operating environment.

To reduce the risk of accidents and spills, U.S. mariners and harbor pilots need information derived from new integrated electronic technologies, such as seafloor mapping, detailed large-scale digital vector charts, precise positioning systems, and real-time and predicted oceanographic and meteorological data. Expanded overseas charting services are also needed to support U.S. military and commercial navigation in foreign waters.

Because most of the nation's harbors and channels are not naturally deep enough to accommodate modern vessels, the U.S. dredges an average of 275 million cubic yards of sediment a year to maintain and improve the 299 deep-draft (greater than 14 feet) and 626 shallow-draft navigation projects. However, routine dredging can be environmentally destructive, and many of America 's greatest seaports have contaminated sediment that
cannot be dredged without harm to the environment. The nation's need for safe, efficient marine transportation must be balanced with the priority of healthy coastal waters.

Ongoing Concerns

• The rapid advance in the technological capabilities of navigational aids has outpaced the government's ability to provide the quality-controlled, standardized data streams needed to "fuel"new navigation products and systems.
• Many areas of U.S. coastal waters have not been mapped in 50 years, including 35,000 of the 43,000 square nautical miles identified in 1993 as critical to U.S. ports and their approaches.
• Although increased maintenance dredging for existing navigation channels and additional dredging requirements for port improvements are required, better dredging techniques have not been identified.
• The greatest threat to safe navigation is human error. Yet, too few educational programs exist to teach commercial and recreational mariners the importance of human error in accident prevention.

Recommendations

• Eliminate the hydrographic survey backlog of 35,000 square nautical miles of critical areas in U.S. ports and their approaches, and map the one-third of the 95,000 miles of U.S. coastline that has never been mapped using photogrammetric methods.
• Complete the production of electronic charts for U.S. and overseas waters, and develop an electronic system for disseminating timely updates and corrections to U.S. military and civilian mariners worldwide.
• Deploy real-time environmental observation and prediction systems, such as the Physical Oceanographic Real-Time System (PORTS), in U.S. high-traffic areas, and complement them with high-resolution predictions of all navigationally significant weather and oceanographic conditions.
• Expedite the development of technologies for maintaining navigation channels to improve the reliability and safety of federal navigation projects.
• Conduct research on effective and environmentally sensitive management of sediment, reduction of the flow of sediment into waterways, remediation of contaminated sediment, and disposal of dredged spoil in an environmentally sound manner.
• Develop educational programs to teach commercial and recreational mariners the importance of avoiding human error in accident prevention.

For more information

http://chartmaker.ncd.noaa.gov
http://www.usace.army.mil
http://www.opsd.nos.noaa.gov/d_ports.html
http://www.uscg.mil/
http://marine.er.usgs.gov
http://www.epa.gov/owow/oceans/dmmp