Characteristics of the drifting ice cover and the scenarios of the ice loads on offshore structures are the major parameters defining durability and reliability of the offshore platforms, building now for the northern Sakhalin. Taking into account the high dynamics of an ice cover in the Sea of Okhotsk, we may suppose the realization of various design cases of combined effects on the structure from drifting ice features and ice fields. In such situations the extreme loads may occur that may be much higher than loads from individual ice features. The study is devoted to the problems of mathematical simulation of the physical process of interaction between the ice cover and the offshore engineering objects of Sakhalin offshore zone in terms of simulation and statistical methods.
The engineering structures for exploring and operation of hydrocarbons in freezing seas should be designed to take up the significant loads from a drifting ice cover. Characteristics of an ice cover are the major problem defining durability and reliability of the offshore structures, building now for Sakhalin Projects. Thus the important problem is to develop a design technique of an assessment of the limit ice loads on offshore engineering structures for their lifetime period. In the worldwide practice of designing of marine offshore ice-resistant structures is believed, that the individual drifting ice features (such as single ridges, stamukhas, as well as giant level ice fields) are the greatest hazard to offshore platforms, as the loads may become extreme values. However in case of the seas with high-dynamic ice cover, such as the Sea of Okhotsk, we may guess occurrence of joint impacts on structure from various ice features, such as pack-ice fields, layered/hummocky ice fields, single ridges, bottom-grounded hummocks, ice masses during piling up, their combinations, etc. In such cases the extreme limit loads may occur exceeding the loads from individual ice features.
