Optimization of crashworthy marine structures

History shows that ferry and RoPax collisions with tankers can be devastating for human life. This paper follows up such a scenario to contribute to rational increase of safety of marine structures. Through the coupling of multi-objective structural optimization and crashworthiness analysis, a conventional tanker structure is optimized for higher collision tolerance, accounting for the change in hull mass, so that the increase in safety is efficient. Two new concepts, proposed here, are deemed necessary for the successful execution of this task: a ‘two-stage’ optimization approach, reducing the number of needed collision simulations, and a rapid collision simulation approach that utilizes coarse FE mesh and reduces calculation time. Combining the obtained results with the state-of-the-art knowledge, a new insight about crashworthy design of tanker structures is also realized.