Home Forums Hunting & Shooting Hunter's Campfire The unions won't like this one - ships without crews

Rolls-Royce is developing a ship that will sail by remote, no crew aboard. The unions are squawking and possibly the pirates won't have anyone to kidnap.

Pirates, eat your heart out: Rolls-Royce envisions crewless drone freight ships
By Nick Jaynes � February 26, 2014

Rolls-Royce doesn�t just make cars. Technically, the Rolls-Royce this story refers to doesn�t make cars at all, as it sold its car division to BMW back in the 1990s. No, the Roll-Royce I�m talking about is the jet engine and ship manufacturer. And its Ocean Blue team has a wild new idea: crewless drone freighters.

The ships, envisioned above, work much like self-driving cars or drones, along with remote human intervention, by relying on cameras and sensors to autonomously pilot their course. The Rolls team has constructed a virtual prototype of the autonomous ship bridge in its offices in Alesund, Norway, where it is running simulations of the operating system.

The London-based company claims the ships would be faster, cheaper to operate, and have a smaller carbon footprint.

Oskar Levander, the company�s vice president of innovation in marine engineering and technology told Bloomberg: �Now the technology is at the level where we can make this happen, and society is moving in this direction. If we want marine to do this, now is the time to move.�

Understandably, there�s much pushback from ship worker unions and as well as some regulatory hurdles to overcome before the self-piloted ships set sail. That said, Rolls anticipates the drone vessels to be in the Baltic Sea within a decade.

The European Union is encouraging the research with a $4.8 million study called the Maritime Unmanned Navigation through Intelligence in Networks (MUNIN), which is a GPS system that would keep drone ships from falling off course.

According to Business Insider, �MUNIN catches sight of the smaller ship well in advance, identifies that it will crash if it stays on the same course, then reroutes, following the green arrow to prevent an accident.�

We�re quite intrigued by the drone ship concept and will be following the story closely. So be sure to check back often for updates.

Curious what maritime law has to say about ships without a captain & crew...

If unmanned, would they be subject to salvage? rules

The article says that they have some hurdles to jump in the regulations. Ya think?

Won't be in our life time... can you see a robot securing a load mid ocean when it comes loose, repairing damaged or leaking equipment... or making emergency decisions on the spot!

Won't happen anytime soon!

Phil

Ought to make it very easy to just steal the whole damn ship instead of kidnapping the crew.

Unions will never let it happen even if it was possible. Remember how long it took the railroads to get rid of the "brakemen" riding in the caboose long after technology had made them totally useless.

As a commercial fisherman I really hate this idea.

It is the future. Get used to it. It's the way all technology advances.
How many shovelers went on the dole with the advent diesels and steam turbines?
They're talking a decade for the first prototypes. That's just around the corner.
They will probably be routed to offshore coordinates where a pilot will board to bring the vessel into port.
Even so, I'd imagine they'll have skeleton crews for a while, until the bugs get worked out.
Eventually, they'll be down to one lonely Maytag repairman type guy just cruising the great oceans with a laptop to talk to the ship and play endless hours of solitare.
Now, there's a job!

HAL - "What are you doing, Dave?"