On 17 November, F.A.S.T. – Fieldlab Autonomous Sailing Technology was officially launched. The boat that will play the leading role in the unique autonomous sailing project was presented. Over the next two years, Vlissingen harbour will be used as a testing ground for a remotely controlled vessel. The project is a collaboration between various parties, including Damen Naval, Province of Zeeland, Municipality of Vlissingen, HZ University of Applied Sciences, TU Delft, and local companies, such as Kloosterboer, Vlaeynatie and Zeeland Boten.

Because of coronavirus restriction measures, the event was organised outside, under the large Schelde crane on the Jan Weugkade, behind the Machinefabriek in Vlissingen. During his welcome speech, Damen Naval’s Director of Naval Sales Support Richard Keulen said that the location was actually very appropriate. “We are standing here surrounded by a lot of history, with the old Schelde crane, the former naval ship and museum Mercuur and the old Machinefabriek,” he said. “But today is all about this little ship that is being presented. FAST is an appropriate name, because developments are moving very fast and it is nice to see how our region can get involved in projects like this.”

Richard praised the cooperation between the Province, the Municipality of Vlissingen, the HZ and TU Delft and the business community. “What we have here is actually a golden ecosystem between government, knowledge institutions, and research and development. There is a lot of capacity in Vlissingen. North Sea Port is actually a maritime ‘brain-port’ and we are proud that we can use Damen’s three local disciplines for this project. We have the yachts of Damen Yachting, the high-quality repairs of Damen Shiprepair, and Damen Naval with the naval construction, which is innovation in itself. We are proud to contribute to this project and to the future of autonomous sailing.”

Project leader Jochem Nonhebel proudly presented the main protagonist of the F.A.S.T. project: the Damen Polycat built at Damen in Hardinxveld-Giessendam in 1990. The vessel will be refurbished and converted in the coming months. The two diesel engines will be replaced by two electric engines that will be at least as powerful as the current ones. Cameras, sensors, radar, Lidar, GPS equipment, wind and speed gauges are also being installed; these will replace the eyes and ears of the helmsman.

“This project is just the beginning of much bigger developments. Ultimately, we want to develop this technology in such a way that we can also implement it on large ships. For example, automatically mooring a ship and avoiding objects,” said Jochem. “In a complex location such as here in Vlissingen’s inner harbour, you have to deal with large and small ships, swimmers and other water users. It’s not easy to identify all the objects in the water, especially for a computer, so we are going to add all kinds of technology to the boat. For safety reasons, there will always be someone on board to make sure that intervention can take place if necessary.”

The F.A.S.T. project received a grant of €1,174,846 from the European ERDF programme as part of the European Union’s response to the Covid-19 pandemic. The condition is that the project contributes to a green, digital and resilient recovery of the South of the Netherlands and that it stimulates innovation within the SME sector within the region. In addition, the project has also received contributions from the national government and the participating parties. Provincial Executive Harry van der Maas handed over the cheque for the European subsidy money to Jochem Nonhebel.