Members have their say on AI in maritime

The latest Nautilus Professional and Technical Forum in January 2025 saw a powerful discussion about the merits and disadvantages of artificial intelligence (AI).

Head of professional and technical David Appleton gave a presentation on AI, highlighting the use of the new tech for assisted navigation and giving examples of products coming on the market. Although AI may be used increasingly for autonomous shipping, he explained, the current cases being made for its use are primarily as a tool to help seafarers.

Vessels are likely to see an increase in cameras and sensors onboard, he added, to collect data that will be processed by AI to alert seafarers and shore staff to potential unsafe conditions. This could improve seafarer safety but raises issues around surveillance and confidentiality.

Members were invited to share their thoughts on AI in maritime, and made the following points, which have been noted and will inform the Union's work at the International Maritime Organization (IMO) and other standard-setting bodies:

We should remember that AI has limits and can't do everything. How would it help crews in a piracy attack, for example? The real people on the ship are the ones who suffer.

We should also be wary of shipowners making excessive claims about the abilities of AI as an excuse to reduce crew numbers and devalue seafarers' skills and experience.

There are worrying issues around liability and culpability if an incident happens involving a vessel operated using AI. Seafarers could take the blame when the fault was with the tech or the company using it.

AI isn't supposed to go into private datasets, but we hear that banks are letting this happen, not to mention the issue with AI being 'trained' without permission on copyright material.

To get data for AI, you'll need more equipment onboard ship that can break down. We'll also become even more reliant on tech like GPS if it becomes AI-enabled, and there are few alternatives.

We shouldn't automatically assume there will be problems with AI, as we've adopted other tech over the years without it being too intrusive for crew. We should speak out about what we want and focus on making AI work for us in areas where we have persistent challenges, like container-stacking.

We'll also need to make sure seafarers are trained properly in the new tech, and this may involve making room in the STCW cadet syllabus by taking something else out. This issue is being dealt with at the moment at the IMO.