Use of the Automatic Identification System (AIS) on Autonomous Weather Buoys for Maritime Domain Awareness Applications

This paper discusses system design of a prototype, autonomous, buoy-based, embedded system for AIS-equipped vessel detection using an AIS receiver and satellite transmitter for near real-time relay of vessel identification data. This paper also describes follow-on enhancements to the system to further extend AIS coverage and field testing of the system. The prototype system development began in August 2004. The prototype system receives AIS data from AIS-equipped vessels on a timed, periodic schedule, processes and verifies received data onboard the buoy, and relays these data from the remote weather buoy via satellite in and near real-time to the NDBC Data Assembly Center (NDAC), and then on to the USCG. The prototype system was successfully field tested March 2005 through June 2005 on four near-shore NDBC buoys located in the Strait of Juan de Fuca, near San Francisco Harbor, near Charleston, South Carolina and near Cape Cod, Massachusetts. Field testing successfully proved the concept of collecting vessel identification data from an autonomous AIS system on NDBC weather buoys. Enhancements to the system were developed from August 2005 to February 2006. These enhancements extend AIS monitoring coverage from periodic AIS monitoring to continuous monitoring and conserve system power by insertion of NDBC weather data into the AIS data stream returning it to NDBC using the low power satellite telemetry of the AIS system rather than the existing high power geosynchronous satellite transmission system in use on most NDBC weather buoys. Extended field testing of the enhanced AIS system on four deep ocean NDBC weather buoys began in March 2006 and will continue through February 2007