Australian EEZ Vessel Traffic Map from AIS Data, 2018-2023

A map of vessel traffic in the Australian Exclusive Economic Zone for the periods 2018/19 to 2022/23. The data are summaries of vessel tracks from AUSREP or AIS, aggregated to the number of kilometers per 0.1-degree grid square. The dataset is provided by the Australian Ocean Data Network and was last updated on 2026-06-17.

Use Cases

• Analyzing shipping density and traffic patterns based on aggregated kilometer-per-grid data.
• Modeling environmental risk from maritime activity based on vessel track summaries.
• Supporting maritime domain awareness and surveillance based on AIS position reports.
• Planning for marine protected areas or shipping lanes based on historical traffic data.

Strengths

• Covers a multi-year time range from 2018/19 to 2022/23.
• Spatial coverage includes Australia's Search and Rescue Region and Exclusive Economic Zone.
• Data is derived from authoritative sources including terrestrial and satellite AIS via the Craft Tracking System.

Limitations

• Description metadata is limited; actual data quality requires manual inspection after download.
• Column-level documentation is absent; field semantics must be inferred after download.
• Row count is unknown, which may limit suitability assessment.

Provenance

Source

Australian Ocean Data Network, sourced from AMSA's Craft Tracking System (CTS) and Mariweb databases.

Collection Method

Built from AIS data extracted from CTS, summarizing vessel tracks between points identified by AUSREP or AIS.

Time Range

2018/19 - 2022/23, with specific data for November 2024 mentioned.

Freshness

Last updated 2026-06-17 00:40:46.796387; freshness should be verified.

Geography

Australian Exclusive Economic Zone (EEZ) and Search and Rescue Region.