Dynamic obstacle avoidance is essential for unmanned surface vehicles (USVs) to achieve autonomous sailing. This paper presents a dynamic navigation ship domain (DNSD)-based dynamic obstacle avoidance approach for USVs in compliance with COLREGs. Based on the detected obstacle information, the approach can not only infer the collision risk, but also plan the local avoidance path trajectory to make appropriate avoidance maneuvers. Firstly, the analytical DNSD model is established taking into account the ship parameters, maneuverability, sailing speed, and encounter situations regarding COLREGs. Thus, the DNSDs of the own and target ships are utilized to trigger the obstacle avoidance mode and determine whether and when the USV should make avoidance maneuvers. Then, the local avoidance path planner generates the new avoidance waypoints and plans the avoidance trajectory. Simulations were implemented for a single obstacle under different encounter situations and multiple dynamic obstacles. The results demonstrated the effectiveness and superiority of the proposed DNSD-based obstacle avoidance algorithm.

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