Use of Wet Dam-Break to Study Green Water Problem

Abstract

Green water occurs when an incoming wave exceeds the freeboard and propagates on the deck of naval/offshore structures, such as FPSO’s and platforms. The water on deck can affect the integrity of facilities and equipments installed on it, compromise the safety of the crew and affect the dynamic stability of the structure. Traditionally, regular or irregular waves generated by different types of wave-makers have been used to reproduce green water events. This is a good practice to study consecutive events. However, to study isolated events, an alternative could be the use of the wet dam-break approach to generate the incoming flow. The purpose of this paper is to investigate experimentally the use of the wet dam-break approach to generate isolated green water events. Tests were carried out in a rectangular tank with a fixed structure. Different freeboard conditions were tested for one aspect ratio of the wet dam-break (h0/h1 = 0.6). High speed cameras were used to investigate the initial phases of green water. Results demonstrated the ability of this approach to represent different types of green water events.