OBS Basket Rail Grid Layout for Safe Deck Handling at Sea
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Solution Overview
Problem
Deep marine seismic exploration operations face challenges in efficiently and safely handling and manipulating large numbers of ocean bottom seismometers due to adverse weather and ocean conditions, leading to safety hazards and increased costs from additional vessels and personnel.
Innovation Solution
A deck configuration with a grid of parallel and perpendicular rails and storage baskets that form containment walls, allowing for controlled movement of storage baskets and OBS units, minimizing swinging and lifting height to prevent accidents and damage, while enabling efficient storage, tracking, and servicing.
Engineering Contradictions & Design Principles
Engineering Contradiction Analysis
1Ease of operation
If traditional tower cranes are used to lift and move OBS units on the deck, then equipment can be moved between locations, but the equipment swings uncontrollably creating safety hazards in rough seas
Solution Approach 1:
The patent introduces containment walls as intermediary structures that act as mediators between the moving equipment (OBS units on carts) and the adverse environmental forces. These walls create a protected corridor that prevents uncontrolled swinging while still allowing equipment movement, thus resolving the safety hazard without eliminating operational capability
Solution Approach 2:
The deck is segmented into distinct zones using containment walls that create controlled pathways. This segmentation divides the open deck space into manageable sections with defined movement corridors, allowing equipment to be moved safely through constrained paths rather than across the entire deck, reducing swinging hazards
2Productivity
If additional surface vessels are employed to handle large numbers of OBS units, then handling capacity increases, but costs and safety risks increase
Solution Approach 1:
The patent utilizes the vertical dimension by stacking OBS units on multi-level carts and using vertical containment walls. This three-dimensional arrangement maximizes the use of available deck space, allowing hundreds of OBS units to be handled from a single vessel rather than requiring multiple vessels, thereby improving productivity while maintaining safety and reducing costs
3Ease of operation
If OBS units are lifted high above the deck to clear equipment and structures, then they can be moved to different locations, but uncontrolled swinging increases safety hazards
Solution Approach 1:
The containment walls provide localized protection along the movement path rather than requiring uniform clearance throughout the entire deck. This allows equipment to be moved with minimal lifting (only sufficient to clear the rail height, preferably only several inches) while the walls prevent swinging hazards in the specific corridor where movement occurs, resolving the contradiction between relocation capability and swinging control
Data Source
AI summary
A configuration for the deck of a marine vessel, wherein parallel and perpendicular travel paths, for movement of individual OBS unit storage baskets, are formed along a deck utilizing, in part, the storage baskets themselves. A portion of the deck is divided into a grid defined by a series of low-to-the-deck perpendicular and parallel rails and each square in the grid is configured to hold an OBS unit storage basket. Around the perimeter of the grid is an external containment wall which has a greater height than the rails. Storage baskets seated within the grid are configured to selectively form internal containment walls. Opposing internal and external containment walls define travel paths along which a storage basket can be moved utilizing a low, overhead gantry. A basket need only be lifted a minimal height above the deck in order to be moved along a path. The containment walls and the deck itself constraining uncontrolled swinging of baskets, even in onerous weather or sea conditions. The system is flexible to meet the needs of a desired operation since the internal walls of the grid can be reconfigured as desired in order to free up a particular storage basket or define a particular travel path.