Time domain simulation of damage flooding considering air compression characteristics

Abstract

An accurate analysis of the entire flooding process is critical to assess the damaged stability when a ship encounters distressed accidents such as collision, stranding, or grounding. Among many factors affecting the flooding process and damaged stability, the complex effect of air compression is significant and worthy of further research. In this paper, through establishing scenarios of the damage flooding for a cruise ship, the commercial software CD Adapco STARCCM+ is applied to perform time domain simulation of flooding processes under different ventilation levels. The basic mathematical models about air compression and specific simulation settings of computational fluid dynamics (CFD) are presented in detail. The simulation results show that water ingression results in an increase of air pressure and density inside the flooded compartment. The corresponding air compression can significantly delay the flooding process if the ventilation level is limited to a certain ratio. Finally, the stability of the damaged ship is affected.