Port designers handbook

Recommendations and guidelines

By Carl A Thoresen

Summary from text book about port design & operation :

1. Wind (page 36)

The wind forces are classified with Beaufort Scale :

Beaufort Description Velocity (m/s) Velocity (knots)

0 Calm 0-0.2 0-1
1 Light Air 0.3-1.5 1-3
2 Light breeze 1.6-3.3 4-6
3 Gentle breeze 3.4-5.4 7-10
4 Moderate breeze 5.5-7.9 11-16
5 Fresh breeze 8-10.7 17-21
6 Strong breeze 10.8-13.8 22-27
7 Near gale 13.9-17.1 28-33
8 Gale 17.2-20.7 34-40
9 Strong pale 20.8-24.4 41-47
10 Storm 24.5-28.4 48-55
11 Violet Storm 28.5-32.6 56-63
12 Hurricane >32.7 >64

Lower wind velocity than 30 m/s should not be assumed for the design of berth structures.
If wind velocity increases above 25 30 m/s the ship would normally either leave the berth
or take in ballast to reduce its wind area.

2. Wind and Wave Restrictions (page 119)

The following operational wind velocities are suggested as limits during the operation based
on experiences around the world :

a. Cruise Terminal
To ensure the gangways remain operationally safe for arriving and departing passanger
and cargo transfer, the maximum wind velocity up to 18 m/s.

b. Oil Terminal
Wind velocity approximately 15 m/s during berthing of tankers less than 60000 DWT.
Wind velocity approximately 20 m/s during loading & unloading operations.
At a wind forecast more than 26 m/s wind velocity, the vessel normally leave the berth
for open sea.

c. Tugboats & mooring boats

It shall be recognized that, due to wind generated or short periodic waves, the tugboats
will have operational limits. With significant wave height of more than 1 1.5 m for
 ordinary tugboats and approximately 1.5 m for tractor tugboats, tugboats start to lose
efficiency in controlling ships.
For modern mooring boat or launches, a wind speed of about 12 15 m/s or a
significant wave height of 1 1.3 m must be taken as guideline limits for safe operation.
If limits are exceeded, the mooring boats will experience difficulty in delivering the
mooring lines from the ship to the mooring post at berth.

3. Maximum Significant Wave Height (page 127)

As a general guidelines for the following maximum significant wave heights (Hs) for head sea
have generally been assumed as acceptable for ships at berth, with wave periods up to 10 s,
shown in table below.

Ship at Berth Maximum Significant Wave Height at Berth (meter)

Marinas 0.15
Fishing Boat 0.4
General Cargo (<30000 DWT) 0.7
Bulk Cargo (<30000 DWT) 0.8
Oil Tankers (<30000 DWT) 1
Passenger ship 0.7

In case when the ship movements, in the captains judgement, exceed the safety limit for
the ship to stay at the berth, it is important that the ship has time to leave the berth and
possibility to do so.

4. Availability of Berth (page 147)

The availability should not only give the overall availability of the berth per year, but also the
availability of the berth for each month.
The downtime of a berth should involve the determination of critical wind, wave, and
current conditions that could cause unacceptable ship motions or mooring line loads, and/or
an inability to operate.