IMMERSEAV Virtual Environments launched its virtual reality (VR) maritime solution in November 2022 after four years of research and development, in close collaboration with reputable shipping stakeholders
The Cypriot company, operating under the Prevention at Sea group, has introduced methods to improve training using simulated scenarios to reduce accident risks. It blends VR technology, scientific knowledge from psychology, and uses neuroscience to profile seafarers and improve their capabilities through training sessions.
Prevention at Sea chief executive Petros Achtypis expects these solutions to minimise shipping accidents. He outlined the problem this sector is facing which needs to be addressed through technology.
“From European maritime safety reports, we know commercial ships were involved in over 19,000 accidents in the last five years,” he said. “Most of maritime accidents refer to collisions, fires, explosions, ships being lost, injuries and other safety-related incidents that are caused by human error and unsafe behaviour."
The International Safety Management code and Standards of Training, Certification and Watchkeeping for Seafarers (STCW) provides legislation for continuous training and certifications to make seafarers act and behave safely during their service on board.
“Yet, the persistence of human failure and unsafe behaviour over the years suggests that needs to be done,” said Mr Achtypis. “The conclusions from scientific research on mental health state that new assessment and training tools are needed to enable shipping companies to staff their ships with skilful, well-trained, beyond typical STCW courses, and psychologically resilient personnel.”
Science can help the maritime industry and seafarers to improve safety behaviour in one of the most difficult professions worldwide. The University of Cyprus cognitive scientist Professor Marios Avraamides said this profession can lead to acute stress, anxiety and fatigue, which often results in more chronic conditions, such as depression.
“Such mental health conditions, either acute or chronic, have detrimental effects on the daily cognitive functioning of seafarers,” said Prof Avraamides.
“For example, we know that stress and anxiety affect negatively the mechanism of selective attention.”
This enables people to select for further processing information that is relevant to the task in hand and ignore the rest. In turn, selective attention prioritises information for gaining access to working memory, a capacity-limited store that is used to control behaviour, such as preparing and executing motor responses, producing verbal responses.
“Cognitive mechanisms, such as selective attention and working memory are largely overlooked during the hiring process,” said Prof Avraamides.
“For example, hiring personnel usually involves in-person or remote interviews via video calls, and typically relies on administering basic tests to evaluate skills and technical knowledge.”
Some model seafarer training also includes e-learning courses and computer-based teaching, which could highlight knowledge gaps and bad practices.
“However, we identified some notable disadvantages such as it does not provide full immersion and interaction with the working environment, it does not evaluate or train personnel in actual and realistic conditions and there are clear limitations in assessing safety or cognitive behaviour under stressful conditions,” said Prof Avraamides.
IMMERSEAV provides an answer to these issues through its wireless VR training system and growing library of maritime VR scenarios.
“Seafarers are immersed individually or as a team on a virtual ship and they are invited to carry out tasks for training purposes or tasks that assess their competency skills and cognitive performance,” said Mr Achtypis.
“Furthermore, these tasks can be carried out either under normal or stressful conditions, allowing IMMERSEAV to determine resilience to external stressors. Results are securely kept under the candidate’s account on the cloud, in line with the GDPR rules.”
IMMERSEAV head of product development and group leader at the CYENS Research Centre, Kleanthis Neokleous, said shipping companies, manning agents and seafarers can benefit from this training.
“IMMERSEAV identifies key metrics of seafarers’ cognitive behaviour and competency skills that lead to their overall safety behaviour,” he said. “It helps shipping companies benchmark new seafarers joining the company against the existing pool of seafarers, identify training needs and set up a personalised training scheme per seafarer executed on a maritime virtual environment.”
IMMERSEAV enables a trainer and a team of seafarers to join the VR task remotely.
“These experiential VR tasks provide a way to test and train personnel in interactive and highly realistic conditions that mimic those that are or may be encountered on board,” said Mr Achtypis.
“Notably, quantitative data about performance is recorded during usage, enabling the seafarer and managers to assess their performance and progress on certain critical items that are regularly reported by international maritime bodies and classification societies.”
Shipping companies will then be aware of the level of individual’s skills and the overall skills level of their pool of seafarers divided in rank, age, nationality, gender etc.
Based on this information, “They are in a better position to know what to expect, create optimum crew synthesis, monitor improvement over years and enhance technical skills on certain ship’s operations, spaces and machinery,” said Mr Achtypis.
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