In order to prevent and minimize damages from natural disasters, this study suggests a 3D visualization form to support ship evacuation, by application and development the geographic information system (GIS). The system has provided an aid to navigation, and the actual ship navigation information is obtained for entire water areas from the analysis of automatic identification system (AIS) data, such as navigation tracking of ships, congestion areas of ship anchorage and evacuation routing support. This study is expected to form part of a novel approach to navigation, and help with the safe and efficient evacuation of ships.
In recent years, natural disasters such as tsunamis and super typhoons frequently occur, which triggered extremely strong winds and waves. Since ships are susceptible to external forces; they can easily lose control in such severe weather conditions, resulting in numerous accidents. For instance, during the 2011 Great East Japan Earthquake, there was a lot of damage to vessels inside ports and harbors, such as drifting and grounding (Tsugane, 2011). Accordingly, when a natural disaster occurs, ships are required to leave the ports and sail to the safety waters. However, ensuring a safe evacuation is a difficult task. Usually, ship navigation dependents on the officer on watch (OOW) and the application of modern navigational apparatus, such as Automatic Radar Plotting Aid (ARPA). However, they are hard to assist and ensure the ship navigation under restricted visibility. When a natural disaster occurs, a large number of ships will start to sail out of the ports in swarms; in addition, many anchored ships crowded in the water areas. Consequently, traffic becomes congested, and the navigation risk is increased. In the circumstances, the ship operators are difficult to know and judge the navigation situation by watching and navigational apparatus, especially at night. In addition, if such tsunamis and typhoons disasters coming in rain or fog, the reliable of radar would be low. However, navigators must analyze the situation accurately and quickly, where available time for reaction is limited.
