Analysis of how the conditions in a collision scenario affect the size of a struck vessel's damage opening and ultimate strength

Abstract

Collisions between ships can have severe consequences, such as loss of ship stability, exceedance of ultimate strength capacity, or spillage of liquid cargo, which depend on the damage caused to the struck ship. The damage caused to the struck ship’s hull depends on the collision scenario, as determined by factors including the striking ship’s speed, the impact location, the geometries of the bow and side-shell structures, and the collision angle. This study presents 144 finite element analyses (FEA) of collision scenarios in which these factors were varied. An analysis is performed to determine which factors most strongly affect the structural damage to the struck ship’s hull. The structural damages identified from the FEA were input into an in-house code that calculated the struck ship’s ultimate residual strength capacity in each scenario. Finally, the correlation between structural damage from the FEA and ultimate strength capacity analyses for all cases is presented and discussed.