Should cruise ships have a double hull ?

Considerations on the Costa Concordia accident

The recent accident involving the cruise ship Costa Concordia on the Italian coast of the Giglio Island is producing the usual questions that arise after any disaster affecting human lives. It is the question of whether the safety of the facility in question is sufficient, be it either a ship, aircraft, train, skyscraper etc. Clearly there is not a complete safety in any order of life, but it is also clear that any current safety level can be improved and the issue is deciding when and where the laws and regulations governing safety are to be changed to get better expectations.

History teaches us that mankind is learning the hard way. When we suffer a great accident is when we consider that perhaps safety provisions are not adequate and should be analyzed in detail and realism to decide whether they should be improved.

Ship lightweight Calculation

(In cargo ships preliminary design)

Introduction

The calculation of the ship lightweight and her center of gravity is one of the basic tasks to be performed in the ship initial design stage, where it is advisable to be able to perform quick, approximate calculations, allowing to quickly analyze many alternative dimensionings. In this blog I present a form to enter the main dimensions of a cargo ship from which the program computes, approximately, the ship lightweight and center of gravity height broken down in Steel, Equipment and Machinery. Results are limited to ships up to 320 m. length between perpendiculars and aspect ratios should be normal.