How low can we go?: validation and verification of a decision support system for safe shipboard manning

The development of a robust and adequate shipboard-manning decision support system, including its validation and verification with two sets of shipboard data, is discussed. It is argued that the need for such a system has arisen since maritime shipping has undergone dramatic changes in recent years. Substantial increases in operating costs in the 1970s and the first half of the 1980s caused shipping operators to focus on adopting more efficient operating practices and reducing shipboard crew sizes. Manning levels on most modern vessels have decreased-from crews of 30-40 in the 1960s and 1970s to crews of 20-30 in the United States and down to 9-14 in Western Europe, Scandinavia, and Japan