AIS tracking vs. vessel monitoring: what does your fleet really need?

AIS stands for Automatic Identification System. An AIS transponder automatically broadcasts data about your vessel over VHF radio and receives the same data from other vessels nearby. In inland shipping you use an Inland AIS device, a variant designed for inland waterways.

An Inland AIS transponder broadcasts, among other things:

• identity: name, MMSI number and the European vessel identification number (ENI);
• position, course and speed, at short intervals while underway;
• dimensions and type of the vessel or convoy;
• navigational status and cargo, for example whether you carry dangerous goods.

In inland shipping, AIS is not optional. The Central Commission for the Navigation of the Rhine (CCNR) introduced mandatory carriage of Inland AIS on 1 December 2014, together with Inland ECDIS or a comparable system for displaying electronic charts. In the port areas of Antwerp and Ghent, use of AIS was required as early as 2011, and Flanders and the Netherlands have also written Inland AIS into their regulations. The device must also be switched on at all times.

Besides a transponder, there is also an AIS receiver. It only receives signals from other vessels and does not transmit anything itself. A receiver is therefore not enough for a commercial vessel; you need a type-approved Inland AIS transponder.

Because every vessel broadcasts AIS signals, you can follow your fleet on a map with an AIS tracking system. That is useful for planning: you see where a vessel is, how fast it is sailing and roughly when it will arrive.

But AIS has clear limits for fleet managers:

• AIS shows where, not why. You see that a vessel slows down or stops, but not whether that is due to a lock, a technical problem or an incident.
• No view of the systems on board. Engine speeds, fuel consumption, alarms or rudder position are not part of an AIS message.
• No footage or audio. AIS contains no camera footage and no VHF radio traffic, which are exactly what you need to understand a situation afterwards.
• Public data. AIS data is visible to anyone with a receiver. It is meant for safety on the water, not as a fleet management tool.
• Coverage. Online AIS maps depend on shore-based receivers and can have gaps.

For a first overview, AIS tracking is enough. For management, safety and reporting, AIS alone is too limited, but it remains an essential building block.

Vessel monitoring goes a step further, with AIS as its starting point. A vessel monitoring system combines your vessel's AIS data with a direct link to the systems on board: propulsion, rudder, sensors, cameras and VHF radio. All this data comes together on a platform ashore and is stored, so you can follow it live and review it afterwards.

At Seafar, this runs through the Vehicle Control System (VCS) on board and a secure connection to the Remote Operation Centers ashore. On top of that come three applications that show what vessel monitoring means in practice:

• Watchtower, a reporting platform for internal users, clients and authorities;
• Atlas, which lets you set geofences for compliance and notifications, for example when a vessel enters or leaves a specific stretch of waterway;
• Blackbox, which lets you review incidents and events with footage, AIS data and VHF radio traffic.

The difference is clearest when something goes wrong. With AIS alone, you see a line on the map afterwards: the vessel slowed down, turned and sailed on. What happened on board and on the water remains a reconstruction based on memory.

With Blackbox, the AIS track remains the starting point, but it no longer stands alone. In the demo below you follow one event from start to finish: during remote operation, an engine stops responding and the vessel makes contact with the quay wall. Blackbox flags the event during the post-handover check, makes an initial AI assessment and immediately notifies the HSEQ manager. One case file then holds the camera footage, the position and AIS traffic, the propulsion data and the VHF radio traffic, transcribed and translated. After the statements of the Remote Operator and the boatmaster, an AI assistant drafts the root cause analysis, which HSEQ reviews and signs off. Corrective measures are tracked until they work, and you share the report in one click.

That kind of traceability is becoming more important. Clients and insurers increasingly ask for evidence, and CESNI, the European committee for drawing up standards in inland navigation, is considering a possible requirement for an Inland Voyage Data Recorder. If you already record everything now, you are in a stronger position when those rules arrive.

AIS tracking is enough if you mainly want to know where your vessels are and when they will arrive. Full vessel monitoring pays off if one or more of these situations apply to you:

1. You manage several vessels and want to follow their status centrally, not just their position.
2. You work with an HSEQ or ISO system and need to investigate incidents and events with evidence.
3. Clients, charterers or insurers ask for reports or evidence after an occurrence.
4. You want alerts when a vessel enters or leaves a specific zone, for example for permits or contracts.
5. You are considering remote operation. Then a complete, secure connection to the vessel is a prerequisite.

Want to see how vessel monitoring works on your fleet? Request a demo and we will show you Watchtower, Atlas and Blackbox on real sailing data.