Tool corrects ECDIS presentation fault
Jeppesen has released the dKart Sounding to Obstruction tool, which is designed to correct an ECDIS presentation fault whereby some shoal soundings may not be depicted on ECDIS displays.
The dKart Sounding to Obstruction tool is being made available immediately to hydrographic offices and producers of electronic navigation charts (ENCs).
Jeppesen claims that its tool is the first and only application that rapidly and securely reviews an entire ENC library for soundings that may not be displayed, fixes them and produces a comprehensive and detailed report of changes made. The application is being released as part of the company’s dKart Inspector and dKart Editor Maintenance subscription agreement, so it is available at no additional cost to organisations already producing ENCs using current dKart licenses.
According to Jeppesen, the International Hydrographic Office (IHO) first made known the ECDIS presentation fault, whereby some shoal soundings may not be presented on an ECDIS display, in April 2009. Mariners were advised to review planned routes in an ECDIS to display "all data", and hydrographic offices were urged to review and update their source material. However, The Motorship and other media did not actually learn about it until nearly a year later when UKHO Notices to Mariners and some electronic chart producers drew our attention to the problem.
Jeppesen dKart tools product manager John K Klippen said: “Jeppesen has developed a solution that programmatically eliminates the ECDIS shoal presentation fault for hydrographic offices and ENC producers, helping them to succeed in their mission of providing the information necessary for mariners to operate safely, “Ours is the first and only tool that automates the whole process of identifying and fixing the appropriate soundings."
The dKart Sounding to Obstruction tool uses an ENC file feed (including the base file and any update files), and checks each ENC for sounding clusters that contain data that should appear as an obstruction, not as a sounding. The appropriate depth is changed to an obstruction object type in the depth position, common attributes are transferred automatically and an option is given to set water level effect attribute automatically. In the ECDIS, when mariners update the resulting ENC files, the shoals that did not appear in standard mode will now appear as obstructions, and automatic grounding alarms will detect them.
Jeppesen says that its dKart Office software is used by the vast majority of Hydrographic Offices worldwide, in addition to companies working on contract for these offices.
