A Basic Study on Mode of Operation for Maritime Autonomous Surface Ship

As the development of the 4^th industiral revolution in the maritime industry has progressed, the technical development of autonomous ships, and the development of international regulations have been accelerated. In particular, the IMO Maritime Safety Committee(MSC) has established a road-map for the development of the non-mandatory goal-based MASS instrument(MASS Code) and started developing a non-mandatory MASS Code at MSC 105^th meeting. Many countries are actively participating in the Correspondence Group on the development of MASS Code, and the development of detailed requirements for MASS functions in the MASS Code is underway. Especially, the concept of "Mode of Operation" for MASS functions was mentioned in the Correspondence Group for the first time, and it is expected that discussions on these modes will be conducted from the IMO MASS JWG meeting to held in April 2023. The concept of "Mode of Operation" will be useful in explaining MASS and MASS functions and will be discussed in the future for the development of MASS Code. This paper reviews the contents of the IMCA M 220 document, which provides guidelines on operating modes, to conduct research on the benchmark for setting the operating modes of MASS.