Estimating Speed Error of Commercial Radar Tracking to Inform Whale–Ship Strike Mitigation Efforts

Vessel speed reduction measures are a management tool used to reduce the risk of whale-ship strikes and mitigate their impacts. Large ships and other commercial vessels are required to publicly share tracking information, including their speed, via the Automatic Identification System (AIS), which is commonly used to evaluate compliance with these measures. However, smaller vessels are not required to carry AIS and therefore are not as easily monitored. Commercial off-the-shelf marine radar is a practical solution for independently tracking these vessels, although commercial target tracking is typically a black-box process, and the accuracy of reported speed is not available in manufacturer specifications. We conducted a large-scale measurement campaign to estimate radar-reported speed error by comparing concurrent radar- and AIS-reported values. Across 3097 unique vessel tracks from ten locations, there was strong correlation between radar and AIS speed, and radar values were within 1.8 knots of AIS values 95% of the time. Smaller vessels made up a large share of the analyzed tracks, and there was no significant difference in error compared to larger vessels. The results provide error bounds around radar-reported speeds that can be applied to vessels of all sizes, which can inform vessel-speed-monitoring efforts using radar.