High-tech alerts help Arctic cruise ships prepare for the worse
As vessel traffic in the Arctic increases with the opening of new shipping routes and a growing interest in Arctic cruises, the need for effective safety protocols is becoming more critical than ever.
Dr Rob Brown, senior research scientist and naval architect at Memorial University’s Marine Institute, boarded the MS Fridtjof Nansen last year to evaluate how safety procedures are being applied in Arctic conditions, and to explore how they might be improved
“Safety was taken very seriously,” Brown said. “The crew and staff were clearly well-trained and committed – not just to passenger safety, but also to protecting the fragile environment and interacting respectfully with Inuit communities.”
From observation to action
Now back on land, Brown is working to analyse the data he gathered and preparing it for use by both regulators and researchers.
“The research I carried out during the cruise will help us better understand the accuracy and performance of personal locator beacons when used in the High North,” he said.
Brown’s journey was part of a stakeholder cruise hosted by the Association of Arctic Expedition Cruise Operators (AECO), which invites groups aboard expedition vessels to promote dialogue about safety, community interaction and operational best practices.
Brown’s preliminary findings were promising, with distress signals from beacon tests received by rescue coordination centers within minutes. Once his analysis is complete, Brown plans to publish the results and share them with manufacturers, model developers and the COSPAS-SARSAT (an international satellite-based search and rescue system that detects emergency distress signals from beacons on ships) to help improve Arctic safety readiness.
“Putting research into action can be a slow process,” Brown notes. “But over time, findings like these often feed into new standards, training courses, or equipment improvements.”
Preparing for a busier Arctic
With climate change and increasing traffic transforming the Arctic, Brown believes that continuing on-site research is vital — not just for the safety of cruise passengers, but for everyone who lives, works, hunts and fishes in the region.
“The Arctic environment can be unpredictable and very harsh. At the same time, traditional Inuit knowledge, such as ice conditions and migratory patterns, is becoming harder to rely on because of climate change,” he explains. “That’s increasing the risk of search and rescue cases at the community level.”
Looking ahead, Brown sees opportunities to strengthen Arctic cruise safety through deeper collaboration with local communities and smarter investment in regional infrastructure. This includes integrating emergency alerting technologies in Inuit communities, supporting safe access to traditional food sources, and improving coordination between cruise operators and local search and rescue teams.
He also highlights the need for Arctic-specific survival gear and training that goes beyond current regulations, alongside future-focused tools such as drones and autonomous vessels to improve search outcomes.
Closer community-level planning needed
Ideally, Brown wants to see safety planning more closely integrated with the needs and capacities of the communities cruise ships visit, including shared protocols for emergency support, and clearer expectations for resource sharing. For example, in a worst-case scenario such as ship abandonment, there needs to be a better understanding of the potential requirements of cruise ships from a rescuing community. That would help to ensure that communities members are also kept safe and not left short of the resources needed to survive the winter season.
“With the right coordination, cruise ships can offer valuable support during emergencies,” Brown says.
