Be in Command by Knowing

These ECDIS Safety Settings

Written by Capt Rajeev Jassal on August 20, 2016

ECDIS has been the talk of the town. On every inspection on

board, compliance with ECDIS procedures has been top agenda
for the inspectors.

It will not be a new thing to say that good passage planning is the
key for safer navigation. ECDIS now being a part of passage
planning contributes to the safe navigation.
I had covered ECDIS in lengths earlier on the topic like

ordering and correcting ENC

Plotting navigational warnings on ECDIS
In these two posts I covered about the process of correcting the ENCs. Can we say
we are all set if ENCs are corrected for Weekly corrections, T&P
corrections, Navigational warnings and navtex warnings ?
But what if the settings on the ECDIS are not what it should be. Wrong settings
pose even bigger threat to the safe naviagtion than the uncorrected ENCs.
In this post I will discuss about the what and how of all the settings on ECDIS.

Safety Settings

It is all in the name. Safety settings sets the safety parameters according to the
ships static as well as dynamic particulars. That is a change ECDIS brought from
the traditional paper charts. For example see this chart and I will ask one question.

Can we say that blue part on this chart is shallow water ?

 It is and it is not. For a small vessel with less draft, it is not a shallow water. For a
big container ship with deep draft, may be.

So you see, the colors on the paper chart may not represent the shallow waters for
all the ships. But on the ECDIS these can be set by the user according to their draft
and other parameters.

There are 4 safety settings

Safety contour Setting

Shallow contour settings

Deep contour setting

Safety Depth setting

To enter a value for these settings on JRC ECDIS, go to

chart -> settings and then choose S-57/C-Map/ARCS.

Now Let us discuss about these settings in detail and what values we need to enter
in these settings

Shallow Contour setting

A contour is a line separating a minimum depth area. For example a 10 meter
contour will be a line that separates waters below and above 10 meters depths.

The contours are in the value of 5, 10, 15, 20, 30 and so on.

Shallow contour value need to be used to tell ECDIS what is the value of shallow
waters for our draft. This is the value of depth below which it is definite for
the vessel to get aground.

The shallow contour value need to be equal to or more than the draft of the vessel.

Let us say the vessels draft is 9 meters and we enter the shallow contour value of 9
meter. The ECDIS will display 10 meter contour line as the shallow contour. If 10
meter contour is not available, it will take next contour as the shallow contour for
the vessel.

The shallow contour lets the navigator know that between 0 meter depth and the
shallow contour, the area is not navigable at all.
Safety Contour setting
Safety contour is the contour line above which we can navigate without any water
depth concern.

So what is the depth of water required for the vessel to navigate without any
concerns ? Off course it is the depth that complies with the companys UKC
policy.

Now again let us see it with an example. Vessels draft is 9 meters and at
maximum speed, the expected squat is 1.1 meters. The company require the vessel
to have UKC of 10% of the draft.
I assume you know the UKC calculation method and can easily arrive to the
conclusion that this vessel would need 11 meters of water depth to navigate.
I have taken here the simplest of the case. In reality you need to follow your
companys UKC calculation sheet to arrive at the depths required to comply with
UKC policy. This may take various factor such as sea conditions, increase in draft
due to rolling, sea water density and the tide.

But the idea is to know the minimum depth of water at which you will comply with
the companys UKC policy.

This water depth becomes the safety contour setting. So if we enter 11 meters as
safety contour setting, it will show 15 meter contour as the safety contour.

Some companies may give simpler instructions for the safety setting in the
navigational manual. One form of these instruction can be based upon the draft of
the vessel.
When safety contour value is entered in the ECDIS, it gives a safety contour line
depths above which would meet the UKC requirement.

Safety Depth setting

So far we have only been talking about contours. We have not said anything about
the actual safe depth. Safety depth is the only depth setting on ECDIS.

Safety depth is the depth of the water we can safely navigate upon. And it might
sound repetitive but it is the depth that satisfies the UKC policy of the company.

In ECDIS we need to enter this minimum depth. It is same what we calculated

as a simple example in safety contour setting. And as I said in that section, we need
to follow the UKC calculation form of the company which may account for
number of factors to calculate the safety depth required.

But the question is why do we need safety depth settings when we can navigate in
waters above the safety contours ? This is because of two straight forward reasons

i) The depth above safety contour may not always be navigable.

This is in case of a shallow depth at one point in the navigable waters. Although
we might be navigating in area above safety contour, this isolated depth pose a
danger. Safety depth highlights this danger.

ii) The depths below safety contour may not always be non-navigable.
We can understand this If you allow me to again go through the safety
contour value we entered. We entered the value of 11 meters and when we enter
this value the ECDIS will take next available contour. This will be 15 meter
contour.

Now the depths between 11 and 15 meters are navigable for us but it will show
below the safety contour. So in the area between shallow contour and safety
contour, safety depth will show the depth on which we can navigate.

Let us say we set the safety depth to 16 meters. On the ECDIS, all depths below 16
metes will be shown more prominently (in Black compared to others in grey
color).
Deep water contour
This is a relative term and user is free to set as per what he believes could be deep
water for him. For me deep water could be 50 meters while for others it could be
30 meters or 100 meters.

But there can be number of ways we can use the deep water contour setting.

For example you can set the deep water contour to show the maximum anchoring
depths where vessel can drop anchor. So if your vessel can anchor maximum 105
meters depth, you can set the deep water contour to 100 meters.

Or if you are about to do ballast water exchange, you can set the deep water
contour to 200 meters. This way you can easily see just by the color on the ECDIS
if you are in depths where ballast exchange can be done.
 The deep water contour setting can be used in number ways and navigators can use
this to the way they wish to use it.

Differentiating the safety settings on ECDIS

Now let us see how the ECDIS screen will look like with all these settings. So let
us say vessels draft is 9 meters and vessel require 14 meters depth to comply with
companys UKC policy.

So we have these settings

Shallow contour: 9 meters

Safety depth: 14 meters

Safety Contour: 15 meters

Deep Contour: 50 meters

And when I enter all these numbers in the ECDIS, this is how a ECDIS screen
would display these settings.
 If you notice, for safety contour ECDIS has taken the 20 meter contour because 15
meter contour is not available.

There is another option in the ECDIS to use two colors to show these areas. When
this option is selected, following will happen

Safety contour and deep contour will merge

Shallow contour and safety contour will merge

Or we can say that light blue and blue color will merge and become blue. Same
way, grey and white color will merge and become white.

So there will be only two colors. One to show the shallow waters and other to show
the navigable water.

Even in the two color display, it is not that we cannot navigate in the shallow
waters. This is because it is showing the contour and not the depth.

In our example, the dividing line will be the 15 meters contour. The area below this
contour will show as shallow waters (blue color). But as the safety depth is
11 meters (which will be below 15 meters contour), we can navigate in the shallow
waters provided the depth is above 14 meters.

Danger detection settings

 Entering the safety settings will warn us with an alarm when vessel enters in
shallow waters. But when it gives the alarm it could be too late by then.

Danger detection settings can help in giving pre-warning of the dangers ahead. We
only need to define the area in which we need the ECDIS to warn us.

We can define the area in two ways

Vector area

Sector Area

Vector area defines the area in length and width. Sector area defines the area in
radius and width (angle).

Vector area defines the area in length and width. Sector area defines the area in
radius and width (angle).
Let us define this area on JRC ECDIS. On JRC ECDIS go to Menu, Settings and
then choose Alarm settings.

This will open the

Alarm settings pane.
Under Vector and Sector section, you can define the area you want the ECDIS to
look ahead. Once these areas are defined you can turn these on by going to
Ownship/Track and then choosing Settings.
You can then choose to either Vector area or Sector area. You can even go to
alarm settings page by clicking on Set alarm limit from danger detection section.

When you choose to display Sector area, it will look like this and ECDIS will
trigger alarm if it detects any danger in this area.
When you choose to display Vector area, it will look like this and ECDIS will
trigger alarm if it detects any danger in this area.

Alarm Buzzer settings

I have talked about different safety settings on ECDIS. But these settings are of no
use if do not have the alarm buzzer volume on. If the volume of the buzzer is off,
ECDIS would not be able to alert the navigator.

But there are times when we need to keep the buzzer off. Like in high traffic
density area when we are constantly monitoring the traffic. In this case frequent
alarms will be of lesser value.

Navigators must use their professional competence to decide when they need to
turn on the alarm buzzer.
On JRC ECDIS to turn on the volume of the alarm buzzer, go to Main, Setting
and then choose buzzer volume.

This will open a pane from where you can increase or decrease the volume of
different type of alerts.

Conclusion
I am a big advocate of use of ECDIS on board for navigation. In my opinion
ECDIS is making the shipping safer. Sure there have been number of incidents
because of users interpretation of ECDIS display but the increase in training and
good practices has helped to cover many gaps. Correct use of safety settings in
ECDIS will definitely take it one step ahead .
Knowledge of what these safety settings mean can help in that.