The Effect of Traffic Complexity on the Development of Near Misses on the North Sea

Vessel traffic is changing due to changing transport demands, larger ships, and new use of sea space, such as windmill parks. This may have an effect on the risks at sea. This paper uses ship state information provided by automatic identification system-messages to analyze the traffic on the North Sea. From the ship-state information conflict situations are selected, i.e., situations where the ships need to maneuver to avoid collision. In addition, situations of near-miss collisions are calculated. It was found that complex conflicts lead to more near misses. It was also found that near misses are not spread evenly over the sea but are concentrated in a number of specific locations. These findings may be important for the design of route structures for ships, as well as for investigations into methods to resolve complex conflict situations.