Mooring lines are safety-critical systems on offshore platforms. Failure of one or more of these mooring lines can result in disastrous consequences for safety, the environment and production.
An increasing number of high-profile mooring failures have focused the attention of operators, regulators and certifying agencies on this problem.
This heightened awareness along with two joint industry projects on mooring integrity has lead to a recognition that maintaining mooring systems is essential for the safe operation of floating offshore facilities.
As offshore exploration and production goes further afield and into deeper waters, more offshore operations are conducted from floating platforms which are moored to the seabed by chain and wire.
Mooring lines are subject to immense environmental and structural forces such as currents, oceans waves, hurricanes.
Other forces include impact with the seabed, abrasion, increased drag due to accumulation of marine organisms and salt water corrosion.
Welaptega developed the Chain Measurement System (CMS) and the Rope Measurement System (RMS) to address the challenge of mooring integrity in floating production.
In addition to floating production, Welaptega’s mooring inspection technologies can be used to measure moorings on mobile drilling units (MODU).
Welaptega CMS is an optical caliper system that measures mooring chain dimensions for chain damage such as elongation, corrosion and pitting. Results are compared to industry standards to assess operational viability.
Welaptega CMS also allows for an up-close visual inspection of individual links so operators can assess the material condition of links.
The system utilizes synchronous digital images of chains from several cameras. It then calibrates these images, corrects spatial geometry and generates statistically reliable measurements of chain dimensions.
