Fatigue assessment of trailing suction hopper dredgers: A study on the contribution of the dredging cycle to the fatigue damage in the bottom door openings

Since the 19th century hopper dredgers have been used for civil operations such as land reclamation and water way maintenance. In the past 25 years a trend of scale enlargement of hopper dredgers driven by economic and productivity reasons is seen. Scaling of the designs has effect on strength and fatigue assessment as well on settling of...