A maritime strategy against piracy
Analysis of statistics based on the past cannot on its own anticipate emerging risks. There is a need for a more dynamic tool kit. This is exemplified by IMO when the HSC Code states that for traditional ships it is possible to use a prescriptive code and ensure a suitable low risk level.
However, for novel or specialised types of ships a prescriptive safety code is too restrictive and probabilistic methods, where the risk for different incidents are kept acceptably low, need to be used. Such a probabilistic code uses a series of standardized expressions to evaluate events and assess the risk associated with the operation of the ship. This is one of the reasons for IMO to introduce risk-based procedures such as the Formal Safety Analysis (FSA) for rule development.
Hans Liwång’s research aims at developing risk based methods for ship security development and evaluation and the research is applied on naval vessels and shipping under the threat of piracy. The aim of this study is to evaluate how, based on probabilistic risk assessment procedures, the operation under piracy threat off the Horn of Africa can be analysed, to support ship owners risk management, development of anti piracy measures and rule making.
The purpose of introducing probabilistic risk assessment into the analysis of pirate attacks is to further develop anti-piracy measures whilst keeping focus on the intended overall purpose of the particular ship. Risk analysis is a tool for identifying and assessing possible unwanted events and finding effective measures to minimise the risk.
The purpose of introducing probabilistic risk assessment into the design process analysis of naval ships is to meet safety goals more effectively through a well-balanced combination of proactive and reactive measures. This could then be used as input to a systems engineering process for concept development, new-builds and midlife upgrades, as well as operational planning. The aim is to get ships more fitted to their intended use.
Hans Liwång, M.Sc. in Naval Architecture from the Royal Institute of Technology (KTH), has about 12 years of experience as an engineer and teacher from the Defence Materiel Administration, KTH and the National Defence College. Since 2010 he is a PhD-student at the National Defence College and Chalmers University of Technology in naval ship design and risk analysis for naval operations.