Onshore Use of Hull Monitoring Data Retrieved from Ultra Large Container Ships

Digitalization is associated with the fourth industrial revolution. It covers many aspects, e.g. sensors. Sensor data can be displayed on board for decision support. Class approved hull monitoring systems do exactly that. This is not new, and it is not about digitalization. There is however a need to use sensor data in decision support onshore. This can be related to an alternative survey arrangement, which can give benefits compared to a rigid inspection regime. The aim is to reduce risk of damages, repairs and inspection costs. To do this, data needs to be collected, quality assured and assessed, and results needs to be displayed to decision makers. This process involves digitalization, and this is new for hull structures of merchant ships. Four container ships are instrumented. They are sister vessels and operates on the same Asia to Europe trade. The hull monitoring supplier has retrieved data from the vessels and converted the data to a supplier independent format stored on a data platform. A quality dashboard and a result dashboard are developed. These dashboards are available through a secure web access for the owner. The experience with the hull response for such large ships is limited. Results for fatigue and extreme loading including the effect of vibration are shown and related to seamanship, inspection and future expectation. Damping is estimated for main vibration modes, which can be useful for numerical analysis. Overall, the structural performance on this trade is good building confidence to the design.