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Friday, November 7, 2025

Orca AI’s Co-Captain Transforms Ship Navigation


A brand new onboard system permits ocean-going vessels to share real-time sea situation knowledge, giving crews early warnings and serving to them navigate extra safely. The system will analyze knowledge associated to navigation, vessel conduct, and the setting to offer ship crews steering at sea.

Whereas casualties from ship collisions and groundings have declined, the general variety of maritime incidents are on the rise, up 22 p.c in recent times, pushed by ageing vessels and tools failures.

Orca AI, a London-based autonomous maritime navigation firm, has launched a software program function referred to as Co-Captain, aiming to cut back these incidents. Co-Captain is an addition to the corporate’s current SeaPod real-time choice help system, which bridge officers can use whereas at sea to navigate higher.

A screenshot shows an image of a boat encountering severe weather, which is also noted as being reported by other vessels. Co-Captain gives details about extreme climate, together with suggestions to particular ships primarily based on their dimension and form.Orca AI

“Co-Captain is a community of vessels utilizing Orca to seize occasions worldwide and share insights. Consider it just like the navigation app you utilize in your automobile: it tells you about site visitors or roadblocks prematurely so you possibly can modify your route,” says Yarden Gross, the CEO and co-founder of Orca AI.

Gross says that Co-Captain ceaselessly collects knowledge from sensors on board vessels and sends it to the cloud to enhance ship efficiency and security for vessels globally.

Orca AI’s Maritime Options

OrcaAI, based in 2018 by Gross and Dor Raviv, the CTO, started with SeaPod and Fleet View. Whereas SeaPod collects and analyzes knowledge on particular person ships, Fleet View gathers that knowledge within the cloud to offer fleet managers on shore higher visibility into bigger operations.

Co-Captain integrates with the prevailing system to supply proactive insights to enhance fleet efficiency and security. In the present day, ship officers depend on instruments like radar, the computerized identification system (AIS), and the Digital Chart Show and Info System (ECDIS) monitor the positions of different vessels and keep away from collisions, however a lot of the work stays guide.

A screenshot shows views off a ship identifying boats and other hazards in a software platform. Co-Captain identifies varied navigational hazards to a ship’s crew. The crew can even manually tag obstacles or different issues.Orca AI

Gross described Co-Captain as the subsequent era of AIS, the community that transmits primary info like a ship’s place, title, and heading over very excessive frequency (VHF) indicators starting from 30 to 300 megahertz. In contrast to AIS, which tracks solely a ship’s place, Co-Captain additionally screens onboard situations. For instance, if a ship reviews a pitch of three levels and a roll of 5 levels in tough seas, Co-Captain makes use of that knowledge to anticipate how present situations will influence close by ships, adjusted for his or her dimension and design. Co-Captain then sends tailor-made suggestions to these vessels’ crews.

“Each ship acts as a node in a bigger community, and every node—the vessel itself—has an onboard AI platform. This platform collects knowledge from a number of sensors in actual time,” Gross says. Utilizing cameras and laptop imaginative and prescient, the AI mannequin can detect unhealthy climate, low visibility, tall waves, or robust winds, then the platform analyzes the info to supply tailor-made steering.

All knowledge is anonymized. Gross says {that a} ship’s actions, timing, or route can reveal beneficial info. “By anonymizing the info, Co-Captain can share vital security alerts akin to GPS interference, extreme climate, or excessive site visitors with out ever exposing which vessel reported it or the place it got here from.”

Gross says that Orca AI is engaged on integrating Co-Captain with extra bridge techniques, akin to Navigational Telex (NAVTEX) and ECDIS, in order that related alerts and updates are centralized.

The corporate’s long-term purpose is to supply real-time notifications centered on crucial occasions alongside a ship’s route, giving captains info they will act on shortly to help safer and extra environment friendly operations. The platform is already in use on over 1,200 vessels.

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