South Korea approves Samsung Heavy autonomous system on passenger ferry

The Korea Maritime Transportation Safety Authority approved the autonomous navigation system on the ferry Tamnara.

The passenger ferry Tamnara, operating at Nami Island in Chuncheon, received autonomous navigation safety assessment approval from the Korea Maritime Transportation Safety Authority yna.co.kr. This marks the first such approval for a passenger ferry in South Korea, as reported by yna.co.kr. The vessel is equipped with the Samsung Autonomous Ship navigation system developed by Samsung Heavy Industries.

This approval follows the safety verification of the same autonomous navigation system on the car ferry Nami 51 in December last year. With the latest authorization, operators expanded the deployment of the technology from vehicle-carrying vessels to standard passenger transport on inland waterways.

Nami Island also plans to install the Samsung Heavy Industries autonomous navigation system on a newly built ferry, the Sequoia, later this year. Operators intend to use accumulated operational data to create deployment models for other inland water transport routes.