SPACE-BASED OCEAN SURVEILLANCE AND SUPPORT CAPABILITY

The use of satellite remote sensing in maritime safety and security can aid in the detection of illegal fishing activities and provide more efficient use of limited aircraft or patrol craft resources. In the area of vessel traffic monitoring for commercial vessels, Vessel Traffic Service (VTS) which use the ground-based radar system have some difficulties in detecting moving ships due to the limited detection range. A virtual vessel traffic control system is introduced to contribute to prevent a marine accident such as collision and stranding from happening. Existing VTS has its limit. The virtual vessel traffic control system consists of both data acquisition by satellite remote sensing and a simulation of traffic environment stress based on the satellite data, remotely sensed data. And it could be used to provide timely and detailed information about the marine safety, including the location, speed and direction of ships, and help us operate vessels safely and efficiently. If environmental stress values are simulated for the ship information derived from satellite data, proper actions can be taken to prevent accidents. Since optical sensor has a high spatial resolution, JERS satellite data are used to track ships and extract their information. We present an algorithm of automatic identification of ship size and velocity. This paper lastly introduce the field testing results of ship detection by RADARSAT SAR imagery, and propose a new approach for a Vessel Monitoring System(VMS), including VTS, and SAR combination service.