Navy Ship Collisions

Discussions revolve around collisions or near-collisions between naval warships and commercial ships, debating radar and AIS detection, crew vigilance, maneuverability challenges, pirate defenses, and the potential for ship automation.

➡️ Stable 0.6x Other
3,410
Comments
19
Years Active
5
Top Authors
#1554
Topic ID

Activity Over Time

2008
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2009
24
2010
34
2011
36
2012
36
2013
62
2014
153
2015
65
2016
143
2017
326
2018
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2019
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2020
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2021
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2022
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2023
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2024
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2025
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2026
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Keywords

US CLI OSHA USCG CCTV AIS UI BBC TERRAIN BNWAS ships ship radar ais collision crew sailing vessel sea boat

Sample Comments

AussieWog93 Oct 6, 2023 View on HN

Wouldn't ships be able to intercept these?

otempomores May 17, 2017 View on HN

Lets call the sailors mechanics and the ships frail tech in harsh environment. Suddenly not a good idea.

exabrial Sep 4, 2024 View on HN

I would think a ship would have sensors for this sort of thing

saddat Sep 7, 2025 View on HN

A captain told me once that it is silly to assume a big ship dropps it’s anchor accidentally unnoted

JSR_FDED Dec 31, 2025 View on HN

Don’t they use something like this on ships to fend off pirates who want to board?

walrus01 Dec 12, 2018 View on HN

Considering the accuracy of the radar systems (and dozens of millions of dollars spent on them) mounted on a modern frigate or destroyer, a warship crew should REALLY NOT be reliant upon other vessels' AIS to avoid collisions. Warships are maneuverable and fast. Physical failings of the ship aside, I think there's something wrong with the complacency of the crew training.

drewzero1 Mar 24, 2021 View on HN

Removing all of the ports could really be a problem for a ship!

rini17 Mar 27, 2022 View on HN

No mention of pirates? Or hackers that can just hijack whole ship.

duxup Aug 11, 2018 View on HN

Considering how long it can take to get the engines started up on a big ship... drifting aimlessly seems a bit risky.

bigmanwalter Apr 28, 2016 View on HN

Isn't it because big ships don't maneuver so quickly?