Research on risk assessment of maritime autonomous surface ships based on catastrophe theory

Maritime autonomous surface ship (MASS), as an alternative to conventional ships, has attracted considerable attention among shipping sectors and is expected to improve the safety and efficiency of future maritime navigation. In this paper, the catastrophe theory is applied to risk assessment of the risk state changes of MASS. Firstly, the risk -accident framework of MASS is constructed to explain the process of risk factors causing accidents, and the whole risk factors are classified into four categories including human behavior, device failure, environment impact, and management problems. Secondly, On the basis of the framework, we propose the fold and cusp catastrophe models of the risk evolution of the MASS to describe the evolution mechanism of accident causes. Finally, simulated test for the MASS was carried out near the coastal waters of China. The simulation results show that management factors play an important role in the risk assessment model of the MASS. As a result, the proposed method may be applicable to the safety monitoring of the MASS.