Marine Vessel Wave Wake: Transient Effects When Accelerating or Decelerating
Publication: Journal of Waterway, Port, Coastal, and Ocean Engineering
Volume 145, Issue 1
Abstract
It is well known that the waves generated by marine vessels, often referred to as wave wake or wash, can cause many issues when operating in sheltered waterways, including, but not limited to, erosion of shorelines and damage to maritime structures, and present a danger to other waterway users. Much research has been undertaken to understand the characteristics of these waves and their effects better, especially for high-speed vessels that operate in shallow water where particularly large and energetic waves are generated. However, in general, all previous studies have considered only steady-state conditions in which vessel speed remains constant; however, many vessel operations, particularly those of commuter ferries, in which regular passages through the transcritical zone to supercritical speeds (in terms of depth Froude number) are required. The present study describes a novel series of model-scale experiments used to quantify the waves during both acceleration and deceleration phases. Notable transient effects were found to occur during the acceleration phase that significantly increased both the height and period of the maximum wave compared to height and period of the maximum wave occurring at the corresponding steady-state speed. The wave characteristics at constant speed were used when assessing whether a particular vessel met wash criteria, and such criteria were likely significantly exceeded when a vessel accelerated to a supercritical speed, which could lead to the occurrence of wave wake issues. In an interesting finding, the study also found no such increase in wave characteristics when the same vessel decelerated back through the transcritical speed zone.
Get full access to this article
View all available purchase options and get full access to this article.
Acknowledgments
We acknowledge the support of the Australian Research Council via the Linkage Project LP150100502. We also thank the AMC technical support team for their valuable assistance preparing the experiments.
References
Akylas, T. R., T. J. Kung, and R. E. Hall. 1988. “Nonlinear groups in ship wakes.” In Proc., 17th Office of Naval Research Symp., Naval Hydrodynamics. Washington, DC: National Academy Press.
Austin, I. 1999. “High-speed vessels and their impacts on wetlands and habitat: A case study from San Francisco.” In Proc., 5th International Conf. on Fast Sea Transportation: FAST ’99. Seattle, Washington: The Society of Naval Architects and Marine Engineers (SNAME).
Calisal, S. M. 1977. “Effect of initial acceleration of ship wave pattern and wave survey methods.” J. Ship Res. 21 (4): 239–247.
Calisal, S. M. 1980. Some experimental results with ship model acceleration waves. Rep. USNA-EW-4-80. Annapolis, MD: Div. of Engineering and Weapons, US Naval Academy.
Ertekin, R. C., W. C. Webster, and J. V. Wehausen. 1985. Ship generated solitons. In Proc., 15th Symp. Naval Hydrodynamics, Seakeeping Problems, Hull-Propeller Interactions, Nonlinear Free-Surface Problems, Frontier Problems in Hydrodynamics, 347–364. Washington, DC: National Academy Press.
Ertekin, R. C., W. C. Webster, and J. V. Wehausen. 1986. “Waves caused by a moving disturbance in a shallow channel of finite width.” J. Fluid Mech. 169: 275–292. https://doi.org/10.1017/S0022112086000630.
Feldtmann, M., and J. Garner. 1999. “Seabed modifications to prevent wake wash from fast ferries.” In Proc., RINA Int. Conf. Coastal Ships and Inland Waterways. London, UK: RINA.
Grue, J. 2017. “Ship generated mini-tsunamis.” J. Fluid Mech. 816: 142–166. https://doi.org/10.1017/jfm.2017.67.
ITTC (International Towing Tank Conference). 2014. Recommended procedures: General guideline for uncertainty analysis in resistance tests. 7.5-02-02-01. Kongens Lyngby, Denmark: ITTC.
Lee, S.-J., and R. H. J. Grimshaw. 1990. “Upstream-advancing waves generated by three-dimensional moving disturbances.” Phys. Fluids A 2 (2): 194–201. https://doi.org/10.1063/1.857769.
Macfarlane, G. J., N. Bose, and J. T. Duffy. 2014. “Wave wake: Focus on vessel operations within sheltered waterways.” J. Ship Prod. Des. 30 (3): 109–125. https://doi.org/10.5957/JSPD.30.3.130055.
Macfarlane, G. J., G. Cox, and J. Bradbury. 2008. “Bank erosion from small craft wave wake in sheltered waterways.” Int. J. Small Craft Technol. B. 150 (B2): 33–48.
Marine Accident Investigation Branch. 2000. Report on the investigation of the man overboard fatality from the angling boat Purdy at Shipwash Bank, off Harwich on 17 July 1999. Rep. 17/2000. Southampton, UK: Marine Accident Investigation Branch.
Murphy, J., G. Morgan, and O. Power. 2006. Literature review on the impacts of boat wash on the heritage of Ireland’s inland waterways. Kilkenny, Ireland: Heritage Council.
Parnell, K. E., and H. Kofoed-Hansen. 2001. “Wakes from large high-speed ferries in confined coastal waters: Management approaches with examples from New Zealand and Denmark.” J. Coastal Manage. 29 (3): 217–237. https://doi.org/10.1080/08920750152102044.
Parnell, K. E., S. C. McDonald, and A. Burke. 2007. “Shoreline effects of vessel wakes, Marlborough Sounds, New Zealand.” J. Coastal Res. 50: 502–506.
PIANC (Permanent International Association of Navigation Congresses). 2003. Guidelines for managing wake wash from high-speed vessels. Rep. Working Group 41, Maritime Navigation Commission. Brussels, Belgium: PIANC.
Soomere, T. 2005. “Fast ferry traffic as a qualitatively new forcing factor of environmental processes in non-tidal sea areas: A case study in Tallinn Bay, Baltic Sea.” Environ. Fluid Mech. 5 (4): 293–323. https://doi.org/10.1007/s10652-005-5226-1.
Soomere, T. 2007. “Nonlinear components of ship wake waves.” Appl. Mech. Rev. 60 (3): 120–138. https://doi.org/10.1115/1.2730847.
Ström, K., and F. Ziegler. 1998. “Environmental impacts of wake wash from high speed ferries in the Archipelago of Göteborg. [In Swedish.] Göteborg, Sweden: Environmental Office.
Stumbo, S., K. Fox, F. Dvorak, and L. Elliot. 1999. “The prediction, measurement and analysis of wake wash from marine vessels.” Mar. Technol. 36 (4): 248–260.
Thomson, W. 1887. “On ship waves.” Proc. Inst. Mech. Eng. 38 (1): 409–433. https://doi.org/10.1243/PIME_PROC_1887_038_028_02.
Torsvik, T., and K. Dysthe. 2006. “Influence of variable Froude number on waves generated by ships in shallow water.” Phys. Fluids 18 (6): 062102. https://doi.org/10.1063/1.2212988.
The Vancouver Sun. 2009. “B.C. fast ferries’ voyage to oblivion leads to Middle East.” July 30, 2009.
Wehausen, J. V. 1961. Effects of initial acceleration upon the wave resistance of ship models. Berkeley, CA: Univ. of California, Institute of Engineering Research.
Wu, T. Y.-T. 1987. “Generation of upstream advancing solitons by moving disturbances.” J. Fluid Mech. 184: 75–99. https://doi.org/10.1017/S0022112087002817.
Information & Authors
Information
Published In
Copyright
© 2018 American Society of Civil Engineers.
History
Received: Dec 27, 2017
Accepted: May 22, 2018
Published online: Sep 25, 2018
Published in print: Jan 1, 2019
Discussion open until: Feb 25, 2019
Authors
Metrics & Citations
Metrics
Citations
Download citation
If you have the appropriate software installed, you can download article citation data to the citation manager of your choice. Simply select your manager software from the list below and click Download.