No anchor drops on the island cables

The challenge

Undersea cables carry power to the islands across a stretch where no ship may anchor. Waiting ships drift in at night anyway. One dragged anchor last winter cut an island’s power for four days, and nobody saw it happen.

How the flow works

With xMap Flows, Yannis built Sentry. Sentry is an AI employee: a flow of 7 blocks.

1. Every five minutes,

   Every 5 minutes (Schedule)

2. across the waters off Piraeus,

   Waters off Piraeus (Area of interest)

3. Sentry listens for every ship,

   Every ship out there (Ships (AIS))

4. spots any that entered the cable zone,

   Entered the cable zone (Zone alert)

5. keeps the ones slowing down to anchor,

   Slowing to anchor (Filter)

6. tells the patrol boat,

   Patrol boat (WhatsApp Business)

7. and marks them on the duty map.

   Duty map (Show on a map)

What it solves

• Ships drift in at night: solved by Schedule and Ships (AIS)
• Nobody sees it: solved by Zone alert and Filter and Show on a map
• Four days without power: solved by WhatsApp Business

The result

Last Thursday at two in the morning, a tanker slowed inside the zone. Sentry warned the patrol boat within five minutes, and the ship moved off before its anchor touched the seabed.

Yannis cannot watch every ship. Now he does not have to.

An illustrative scenario: the figures are modelled to show what the flow produces, not a customer's results.

The flow, block by block

1. 1

   Every 5 minutes

   Schedule

   Starts the flow on a timetable.

2. 2

   Waters off Piraeus

   Area of interest

   Sets where the flow looks: countries, cities or specific places, or areas you draw on a map.

3. 3

   Every ship out there

   Ships (AIS)

   Ships at sea or in port right now, from AIS (the signal ships send with their position, speed and heading; live from AISStream): every vessel heard in the Area of interest before this block, or around a point.

4. 4

   Entered the cable zone

   Zone alert

   Reports items (ships, for example) that entered, crossed, are inside or left a zone.

5. 5

   Slowing to anchor

   Filter

   Keeps only the items that match a rule.

6. 6

   Patrol boat

   WhatsApp Business · WhatsApp

   Send text, media and template messages from your WhatsApp Business number.

7. 7

   Duty map

   Show on a map

   Shows the results as points on a map, with the area of interest.

Templates to build it

Ready-made flows with the same blocks. Open one, change the city and the kind of place, and run it.

• Cruise ships arriving at the portAn alert, with WhatsApp to the guides, when a cruise ship enters the port.
• Fast boats entering a protected areaFast boats entering a protected area, sent to enforcement at once.
• Ships approaching the pilot boarding areaShips entering the pilot boarding area, to the pilot station every 15 minutes.
• Fishing boats inside a marine protected areaFishing boats inside a protected area, to the officers every hour.
• Ships entering my zoneAn email when a ship enters or passes through your zone, every hour.
• Heat stop for outdoor work, every hourA WhatsApp heat stop to supervisors when a site reaches 45 degrees.

Industries

Learn how it works

• GeofencingA virtual boundary that triggers something when an item enters or leaves it.
• AIS (ship tracking)Radio messages ships send with their identity, position and course.
• How to be alerted when ships enter a port areaA zone, a live AIS stream and an alert.
• Zone alerts: know when something enters an areaShips, vehicles or any moving item crossing your zone.
• Ships (AIS)Ships in a sea area, their type, speed and destination.
• Draw your areas and pointsShapes, circles and points with a distance around each.

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