EPDIS: The Electronic Pilot Book Display System

The Electronic Pilot Display and Information System (EPDIS) is a new technology that present the traditional Pilot Book in electronic format by means of the current and latest information and visual representation developments. EPDIS is a project co-funded by the European Commission, DG IST and Fifth Framework Program, incorporating six partners from four different EU countries (Germany, Estonia, Spain and Portugal) forming a consortium. The idea is to provide a system that integrates a 3D view of the coastline as seen from the ship’s bridge connected to an information system which is basically a compendium of the data contained in the traditional Pilot Book and other complementary texts like guides to port entry, radio signals and lights books. The 3D visualization of landscapes and shorelines is built by means of digital elevation models (DEM) and a basic electronic charting system based on the Standard S-57. This 3D view is complemented with architectural models of the relevant buildings and marks which are sued for navigation in order to recognize difficult sailing areas. In this way a 3D viewer has been designed as a result of this research and development. The pilot book information is integrated into another database system. The Electronic Pilot Book, as it is called, is a system that organizes the textual information and images from paper pilot books in geo-referenced blocks, this structure of data could be accessed or queried for the electronic chart system when a zone or conspicuous point in the 3D viewer needs explanation. By means of an SML protocol many problems of connectivity and data transfer can be eliminated, mainly all those related to the data formats because of the different kinds of information blocks (text, images, mail addresses, telephone numbers, etc). This paper describes the most relevant aspects for the development of the EPDIS system and the results obtained from the work done on the trial areas of the Baltic Sea, the Portuguese Coast and the Spanish Mediterranean.