BRAINS and Boat Accidents
Coast Guard Boating Risk Analysis Information System
The Coast Guard has developed a statistical modeling program that explores the effects of various accident factors and their overall contribution to an accident.
Exploiting the statistical correlations that exist between boating accident report variables, the Boating Risk Analysis INnformation System (BRAINS) tries to determine the chances that a particular accident can happen based on the variables provided by a system user. BRAINS is meant to help boating safety researchers better understand the effect different accident variables can have on each other towards causing an accident. Accident variable information is pulled for BRAINS from the U.S. Coast Guard's Boating Accident Report Database (BARD).
A Matter of Relationships - The uses the statistical relationships between accident report variables within the System to determine the probability that a specific accident could occur given the conditions entered by a user. BRAINS enables those interested in boating accidents to determine the effect a specific variable, or group of variables, have on the probability that a specific accident could occur based on the relationships between variables within the BARD System. Knowing how accident variables work together in known incidents provides insight into the probability of an accident occurring under uncommon or hypothetical conditions.
What If? - An example used by the Coast Guard is answering the question of what factors might increase or decrease the likelihood of a capsizing or sinking accident in New England. BARD data shows that 18% of open powerboat and 83% of canoe accidents reported involved capsizing. Statistically a canoe would have a 3.6 greater chance of being capsized compared to an open powerboat. What other factors influence the chance of having an accident. Factor that can be considered are the presence of a strong current and overloading. Data shows 4% of open powerboats and16% of canoes reported a strong current as a factor in their accidents. Overloading was a factor in 3% of the power boats and 12% of the canoes.
Outcomes - BRAINS takes these accident factors into account and provides these rough conclusions. Generally for both canoes and open powerboats, overloading makes any boat 5.6 times more prone to capsizing and strong current makes the same accident some 2.2 more times more likely. When comparing canoes with open powerboats, canoes are 3 times more likely to be involved in an accident involving a strong current and 3 times as likely to be overloaded. Changing your use of an open powerboat to a canoe under strong current and overloaded conditions increases the odds of capsizing 5.6 times.
Its Relative - Probabilities generated by the system do not represent the probably that an accident will actually occur, but rather the relationship of accident variables have relative to other values. Since many accidents go unreported, BRAINS generates data relative to known information rather than make absolute predictions on what isn't totally known about boating incidents.
BRAINS is available for public use as a web based application or more sophisticated program available for downloading to your own computer. If you have more than a passing interest in the causes of boating accidents, it is interesting to explore the BRAINS model online at the Boating Risk website.
