Pattern Recognition of Ship Navigational Data Using Support Vector Machine

A ship's sailing route or plan is determined by the master as the decision maker of the vessel, and depends on the characteristics of the navigational environment and the conditions of the ship. The trajectory, which appears as a result of the ship's navigation, is monitored and stored by a Vessel Traffic Service center, and is used for an analysis of the ship's navigational pattern and risk assessment within a particular area. However, such an analysis is performed in the same manner, despite the different navigational environments between coastal areas and the harbor limits. The navigational environment within the harbor limits changes rapidly owing to construction of the port facilities, dredging operations, and so on. In this study, a support vector machine was used for processing and modeling the trajectory data. A K-fold cross-validation and a grid search were used for selecting the optimal parameters. A complicated traffic route similar to the circumstances of the harbor limits was constructed for a validation of the model. A group of vessels was composed, each vessel of which was given various speed and course changes along a specified route. As a result of the machine learning, the optimal route and voyage data model were obtained. Finally, the model was presented to Vessel Traffic Service operators to detect any anomalous vessel behaviors. Using the proposed data modeling method, we intend to support the decision-making of Vessel Traffic Service operators in terms of navigational patterns and their characteristics.