Risk Analysis of the Vessel Traffic in the Strait of Istanbul

Abstract

The Strait of Istanbul, the narrow waterway separating Europe from Asia, holds a strategic importance in maritime transportation as it links the Black Sea to the Mediterranean. It is considered as one of the world's most congested and difficult-to-navigate waterways. Over 55,000 transit vessels pass through the Strait annually, roughly 20% of which carry dangerous cargo. In this study, we have analyzed safety risks pertaining to transit vessel maritime traffic in the Strait of Istanbul and proposed ways to mitigate them. Safety risk analysis was performed by incorporating a probabilistic accident risk model into the simulation model. A mathematical risk model was developed based on probabilistic arguments regarding instigators, situations, accidents, consequences, and historical data, as well as subject-matter expert opinions. Scenario analysis was carried out to study the behavior of the accident risks, with respect to changes in the surrounding geographical, meteorological, and traffic conditions. Our numerical investigations suggested some significant policy indications. Local traffic density and pilotage turned out to be two main factors affecting the risks at the Strait of Istanbul. Results further indicate that scheduling changes to allow more vessels into the Strait will increase risks to extreme levels. Conversely, scheduling policy changes that are opted to reduce risks may cause major increases in average vessel waiting times. This in turn signifies that the current operations at the Strait of Istanbul have reached a critical level beyond which both risks and vessel delays are unacceptable.

Risk Assessment in the Istanbul Strait Using Black Sea MOU Port State Control Inspections

“…The number of ships passing through the Istanbul Strait from 2005 to 2014 are shown in Table 1 [3]. Contrary to these studies, in this study the risk arising from maritime transportation in the Istanbul Strait are determined based on the performances of flag states on the Black Sea MOU, as well as the number of passing and casualty rates of flag states in this region.…”

“…They also investigated the impact of various factors, which included vessel arrivals, scheduling policies, pilotage, overtaking, and local traffic density, on the risk profile of the Strait. Local traffic density and pilotage were found to be two main factors affecting the level of risk [3]. Contrary to these studies, in this study the risk arising from maritime transportation in the Istanbul Strait are determined based on the performances of flag states on the Black Sea MOU, as well as the number of passing and casualty rates of flag states in this region.…”

“…In addition to these factors, there is another factor making navigation hazardous: that is the intense volume of local maritime traffic. On a daily basis, many passenger boats, passenger and car ferries, and sea buses traverse the Strait [3]. Therefore, maritime shipping poses a particularly high risk to the region.…”

Ship Collision Frequency Estimation in Port Fairways: A Case Study

“…Debnath and Chin (2010) employed two indicators including Distance at Closest Point of Approach (DCPA) and Time to Closest Point of Approach (TCPA) to represent the spatial and temporal closeness between a pair of ships. Because of the simplicity, a large number of researchers (e.g., Fujii, 1974;Macduff, 1974;Tan and Otay, 1999;Fowler and Sorgard, 2000;Szlapczynski, 2006;Pietrzykowski and Uriasz, 2009;Uluscu et al, 2009;Wang, 2010) estimated the number of dangerous encounters by counting the overlaps of two ship domains. We employ this method to estimate the number of dangerous encounters in this study.…”

“…Various mathematical models, such as ship domain models (Fujii, 1974;Macduff, 1974;Tan and Otay, 1999;Fowler and Sorgard, 2000;Szlapczynski, 2006;Pietrzykowski and Uriasz, 2009;Uluscu et al, 2009;Wang, 2010) and speed dispersion model (Qu et al, 2011), are available to evaluate the number of dangerous encounters. However, one significant drawback of these existing models is that the effects of the angle between two ships, ship types and ship lengths on the ship's capability of avoiding a collision accident have not been taken into account.…”