SAM Electronics, an L-3 company, has equipped Viking Line’s new 57,000-gt passenger ferry, Viking Grace, with a NACOS Platinum integrated navigation control system together with a Valmatic Platinum integrated automation system from its associate company, L-3 Valmarine.
Built by STX Finland at its Turku yard and designed for cruising the shallow waters of the Finnish and Swedish archipelago, Viking Grace is the world’s largest LNG-fuelled ferry and the most environmentally friendly and energy-efficient vessel of its type. It is due to begin service this January and will comply with stringent 2015 Baltic regulations on gas emissions.
The state-of-the-art NACOS Platinum bridge system comprises four S- and X-band radars linked to a series of five Multipilot, Chartradar and Ecdispilot multifunction workstations for control of all main radar, ECDIS and conning operations in addition to those for automatic steering and voyage planning. Supplementary workstation consoles and displays are located at starboard and port wing areas as well as the captain’s cabin. Secondary sensors, consisting of AIS, VDR, DGPS, doppler log and echosounder navaids, additionally include SAM’s new Bridge Navigational Watch Alarm System (BNWAS).
L-3 Valmarine’s similarly advanced Valmatic Platinum integrated automation system for control of all machinery includes added capabilities for vessel power management and emergency shutdown. Complete management control is achieved through a dedicated communications network connected to multifunction workstations in the engine control room and on the bridge. In addition, the system also includes four control/monitoring workstations around the vessel and a ship-wide network for monitoring access via portable multifunction workstations.
Also interfaced via redundant connections to the Valmatic Platinum system’s communications network is an Emergency Shutdown System (ESD). An independent facility based on the same platform, it operates its own process control station communications network, remote IO units, hard-wired control panels and associated workstations.