Modelling uncertainty using neutrosophic sets for precise risk assessment of marine systems

Currently, risk/safety assessment is of prime importance in any industry. But, precisely assessing the risk is very difficult because of the complexity of engineering systems. The maritime industry is one such industry that works in a highly complex environment. Though a number of serious accidents are less in the maritime industry as compared to other shore based industries, the impact of even a minor accident can be catastrophic. The accidents have a serious impact on marine life, the environment, machinery and even on the life of people onboard ship. Since the loss of human life cannot be monetarily quantified, reducing the number of serious accidents and improving maritime safety is the main motive behind the risk assessment. Researchers’ concern towards marine accidents and maritime safety is addressed in this work and ways to handle the uncertainty for precise assessment are proposed. This work focuses on different types of accidents in the marine industry, a review of previous attempts from researchers in building models to improve safety and methods to quantify uncertainty due to ignorance and fuzziness. A model is proposed using the Single Valued Neutrosophic Set and Dempster-Shafer method of evidential reasoning for risk assessment. An illustrative example of a marine system onboard ship is given to show the applicability of the proposed model. A sensitivity analysis is carried out to partially validate the model.