An enhanced method for extreme loads analysis

The analysis of time records, coming from seakeeping experiments in irregular waves, is used to determine the occurrence of extreme events. The common procedure used for data analysis is to assume that the statistics of record’s peaks is following two or three parameters Weibull distribution. For particularly severe sea states it can happen that the peaks assume a multi-modal distribution. In this case, a Weibull distribution is not suitable, also in the three parameters form, to reproduce the peaks population. That means some errors in the estimate of the extreme loads may occur, affecting consequently the vessel/structure design process. To overcome this source of error it is possible to use multi-modal distributions, or to change the peaks extraction technique, adopting a certain threshold. By using this second approach data should be fitted according to a Generalised Pareto distribution. Based on this theory, a data analysis procedure including the threshold selection is here proposed and tested on a set of time records coming from seakeeping model-scale experiments. The results are then compared with the standard Weibull approach.