Nearly real-time, safety-related, remotely accessible marine GIS

The paper presents the prototype of safety-related application of the newly developed real-time, remotely accessible marine GIS for water pollution monitoring and emergency management supporting. The system is able to integrate many different types of marine pollution survey data, including those acquired by acoustic sensors. It processes the data extracted from acoustic echo signals and supports the instantaneous 2/sup D/ and 3/sup D/ visualisation and mapping of pollution aggregations (oil spills, discharge material plumes etc.). It also deals with the multi aspect data management and data analysis, and the prediction of the pollutants behaviour. The system makes use of the SQL database standard for data storage and the Scalable Vector Graphics (SVG) and Virtual Reality Modelling Language (VRML) for geographical objects remote presentation. Moreover, it requires only the WWW browser with SVG and VRML plug-in on the client side.