Patent ID: 7685953

Claim:
A system for rapid, secure transport of cargo by sea comprising: a ship including a hull producing a high pressure area at a bottom portion of a stern which rises from a point of maximum depth forward of a longitudinal center of the hull to a point of minimum draft at a transom which produces hydrodynamic lifting of the stern at a threshold speed above a length Froude Number of 0.40; sides of the hull at a datum waterline are non-convex in plan with reference to a centerline of the ship; a length-to-beam ratio at the datum waterline is between 5 and 7.5 and a displacement to length ratio equal to a displacement of the hull divided by a cube of the length divided by 100 during operation of the hull in carrying fuel and payload is between 60 and 150 and a maximum operating Froude Number is between 0.42 and 0.9; a weather deck closing a top of the hull, at least one cargo carrying deck disposed below the weather deck and having a driving surface for self propelled, automatically guided vehicles transporting cargo to and from the ship through an opening in the stern of the ship and at least one lower deck disposed below the at least one cargo carrying deck; at least one water jet disposed within the hull with each water jet having an inlet in a bottom portion of the stern which produces high pressure during motion of the ship; at least one power unit disposed on one of the at least one lower deck coupled to the at least one water jet for powering the at least one water jet to cause water to be drawn into the inlet of the at least one water jet to produce forward motion of the hull; and an arrangement for loading and unloading cargo through the opening in the stern of the ship and along the driving surface of the at least one cargo carrying deck, the arrangement including at least one self-propelled, automatically guided vehicle for carrying cargo to be transported during loading and unloading of the ship; a self-contained security scanning system on the at least one vehicle for maintaining control and surveillance of cargo in transit on the vehicle; wherein the ship includes a reader grid having a plurality of readers in different, spaced locations along the at least one cargo carrying deck for reading identification means on cargo on the deck and for communicating readings from the individual cargo identification means to a ship communication system; and wherein the ship communication system includes a ship server which communicates with global and local information centers, a super base on each cargo carrying deck which is linked to the ship server, and a plurality of base stations on each cargo carrying deck communicating with respective ones of a plurality of groups of readers of the reader grid on the cargo carrying deck.