THE AMERICAN SOCIETY
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CITATION:
The paper, "Probabilistic Fatigue Life Prediction for Ship Structures Using Fracture Mechanics," was presented at the ASNE Day 2000 Annual Meeting and Exposition on May 19, 2000, and published in the Naval Engineers Journal of July 2000. This paper discusses and demonstrates the use of probabilistic linear elastic fracture mechanics to model fatigue of ship structure. Probabilistic analysis requires the use of reliability methods for assessing fatigue life by considering the crack propagation process and the uncertainties associated with it. As an improvement to the traditional probabilistic fatigue fracture approach, this paper presents a methodology for probabilistic analysis of ship structure fatigue failure considering the effects of the residual stresses induced by the hull fabrication process over the crack growth rate.
The application of Drs. de Souza and Ayyub's methodology can be viewed as a significant first step toward the ultimate goal of developing reliability-based design rules for ship structural fatigue based on fracture mechanics.
In developing and demonstrating this highly valuable methodology, the authors have made an important and lasting contribution to the naval engineering profession, and are worthy to receive the Society's 2000 "Jimmie" Hamilton Award, in keeping with the highest ideals of the Naval Engineers Journal.