Operational risk assessment of offshore transport barges

Abstract

Offshore operations such as load-out/float-off, transportation and installation involve a large number of operational hazards which impose high risks on human safety and assets. During such operations, there are many situations in which transport barges and Heavy Lift Vessels (HLVs) may expose to significant hazards including structural and mechanical failures. In this work, the system of a submersible barge was reviewed based on a Hazard Identification (HAZID) technique in order to identify the worst-case scenarios during load-out/float-off operations. In addition, a fuzzy set approach was developed to quantify and assess the risk level during offshore operations of an offshore structure due to several hazardous scenarios. Rule-based fuzzy logic models were created and tested using different types of membership functions to calculate risk values, and the potential hazard impacts on the safety of crew members, the environment, the barge and the offshore structure being loaded/launched were evaluated. Fuzzy set techniques enabled a further sensitivity analysis to be conducted for the top-ranked failure modes. Overall, the paper contributes towards the development of the current guidelines for offshore operations.