In the 2011 Tohoku earthquake and tsunami, a lot of sea disasters of ships moored along terminal inside harbor basins occurred. In order to understand the behavior of ship, it is important to find out a method of the tsunami wave force of ship. In this paper, a physical model test on tsunami wave force of a ship, which is modeled as 90,000DWT class coal carrier affected by the disaster, has been conducted in two-dimensional water tank during a tsunami bore in following sea. The surface elevation, current, tsunami wave forces of the ship have been measured. The tsunami wave forces have been investigated, compared with those of mooring loads of the model ship in mooring.

Utilizing virtual space simulation technique on which we can simulate workflow lines virtually, deck arrangements were examined on a small-scale trawl fishing boat for efficient on-board work. The basic arrangement and work contents were based on an actual fishing boat operated in Ibaraki Prefecture. Three types of deck arrangement reproduced in virtual space, that is, the existing arrangement (bridge on the center of the hull, fish holds on the bow-side, and work deck on the stern-side), the bow-side bridge arrangement (bridge on the bow-side, fish holds and work deck on the center and the stern-side), and the bow-side bridge arrangement with a wider ship hull. The workflow lines during the fish catch transportation work were simulated. As a result, the working time were about half, and the walk distance were about 40% of the existing arrangement for the two types of the bow-side bridge arrangements.

In recent years, marine development for undersea energy resources and offshore wind power, development areas are expanding from shallow waters along the coast to deep waters in the open ocean due to technological advances. Generally, the DP (Dynamic Positioning) system is used to maintain a fixed point by automatically controlling propellers and thrusters or other propulsion unit against wind/wave disturbances for holding ship’s position. Engineers such as university students and DPOs (Dynamic Positioning Operators) engaged in marine development need to acquire sufficient understanding and knowledge of such marine development-specific operations and ship handling methods. Since a handling error caused by the DPO will cause an operation stop and accidents, it is necessary to conduct training method in the environment that is more suited to the actual situation. In this research, the author constructed a DP simulator that simulates the actual sea area and targets multiple DP ships. The author has also developed six types of classroom and DP simulator hands-on training programs, respectively. Finally, we conducted an educational experiment on the students and evaluated the achievement level and improvement points of this training program using the evaluation method of student questionnaire.

Pusher-barge system (PBS) consists of two parts, namely, an unmanned cargo-stowage part and a manned propelling-power part. While a barge is loading/unloading shipments at a berth, the pusher-tug can uncouple that barge and couple another barge to transport the next shipments. This study investigates the economic impacts of different operation methods and departure-time with time-window in a multi-port PBS. We model the pusher-barge scheduling problem to determine simultaneously both the number of pusher-tug and barge deployed, and those optimal operation schedules. Through the numerical experiments, we found that the flexible departure time has a significant impact on the total cost rather than different operation methods of pusher-barge.

The JIS anchor, i.e., Stockless A-type anchor, hereinafter JIS-type anchor, is one of the most popular used anchors in Japan and is equipped on many ships. In order to prevent anchoring accidents, the holding ability of the JIS-type anchor must be clarified with respect to detailed seafloor sediment components. Therefore, the seafloor sediments were herein classified into six categories based on their particle size in the nautical chart and divided into seven groups. First, we built an sediment map around Japan’s coastal area using these seven groups. Second, using a JIS-type anchor, the maximum holding coefficient was studied for two towing speeds (0.18 and 0.02 kt) and six towing angles (every 5° from 10° to 30°). The maximum holding coefficient was achieved when the sediment group was “fS M” (“SM” in the nautical chart). However, the holding coefficient became half when the sediment group was “M Cy” (“M” in the nautical chart). Furthermore, the maximum holding coefficient was obtained when the towing speed or angle was 0.18 kt or 10°, respectively.

To operate a ship safely, it is very important for a captain and officers to understand characteristics of waves encountered with the ship. For the purpose, appropriate wave measurement is required, however, there are advantages and disadvantages to the existing method. Therefore, it is also important to construct another method. In this research, it is focused on a draft sensor that can output digital signal, which is being installed in some ships. And it is attempted to develop a new wave measurement system using draft measurement system constituted four sets of draft sensors which installed fore, middle port side, middle starboard side and aft. To verify the accuracy of the developed system, onboard experiments were conducted. From the comparison with a set of data obtained by NOWPHAS (Nationwide Ocean Wave information network for Ports and HArbourS), it is confirmed that the developed system is effective for the wave measurement.

To increase boat speed during cutter races, improving the rowing efficiency of oars is important. To clarify the characteristics of rowing cutters, total 17 patterns rowing experiments were carried out at Togitsu Port in Omura Bay, Nagasaki Prefecture. At this experiments, total 6 scullers rowing power were measured and estimated total rowing power or rowing efficiency with changing scullers positions, respectively. Moreover,the boat speed was also recorded using a portable GPS device. Experimental results showed a difference of more than twice the rowing power was observed when the rowing position was changed even with the same rower, showing strengths and weaknesses. However, no correlation was observed between a subject’s average rowing power and their physique (height, weight, body fat mass, muscle mass, BMI, and FFMI). Furthermore, the rowing power may be attributed to factors other than physique. The average mean total rowing efficiency was 25.7% ± 2.1% (± S.D.) during headwinds. Even when the members are together, the rowing efficiency showed a difference of more than 7%, simply because the scullers were arranged in different positions. The rowing power and technical factors were suggested to be important factors influencing the rowing efficiency.

Osaki-Kamijima Island is an area which has developed through building of wooden ships and the activities related to shipbuilding such as marine transportation and training of crewmembers, and also through the agricultural industry such as growing citrus fruit. However, due to the change of industrial structure, population decline has been noticeable, and the Island is now referred as an “Island facing possible extinction”. The authors carried out a research on the changes of the maritime history at the Island which once prospered in shipbuilding, marine transportation and training of crewmembers.

We started with a research of written materials and interviews with local people, and the collected written materials and photos were digitalized into an archive. We focused to a research on the ships built in the Island between 1873 and 1982 and obtained data for 1,622 ships. In this paper, we report the changes which we found regarding shipbuilding from Meiji Period to Showa Period at the Island.

The authors aim at producing an “Educational material to learn local industrial legacies” in the near future for the children growing up in the areas facing the Geiyo-Shoto Islands and the Seto Inland Sea.

Container terminals are important to support economic activities. In Japan, it is growing fast the trend to adopt a remote automated guide system in the storage yard area. When introducing a remote automation container terminal, it is effective to validate the layout plan and control system through a container handling simulation model. Previous studies have shown that the key performance indicators of container handling operations have been calculated only using the equipment catalog specifications. However, the spreader of the Rubber Tired Gantry Crane (RTG) may take shortcuts according to the shape of the container bay, which might be a problem when developing a container handling model. In this paper, a container handling simulation model was built utilizing the daily report operation parameters instead of only the equipment cataloc specifications. As a result, it is shown that the simulation model is effective to reproduce improvements in the operation of RTG systems.