A Dropped Object (DO) study, usually conducted in part with other risk assessment studies, is predominantly required to support the design of onshore and offshore facilities. It is undertaken to assess the hazards and risks involved in potential falling objects and swinging load impacts during lifting activities in industrial facilities. Typical studies involve impacts to onshore and offshore platforms, subsea pipelines and flowlines, structures, and process equipment.
Objectives
⦁ Identification of the lifting activities which may impact the installation in safety perspective.
⦁ Assessment of the scenario of objects being dropped onto the equipment’s and pipelines during lifting using pedestal crane.
⦁ Determination of the impact and, if any, damage associated with the identified dropped object scenarios.
⦁ Identification of vulnerable areas of the facilities to potential damage from dropped objects and recommendation of appropriate risk reduction measures.
Methodology
The study involves the following steps: Description of lifting operations, Hazard Identification, Frequency Analysis, Probability of Hitting Target Area on the Deck, Impact Assessment, Dropped Object Protection.
The methodology for conducting DO studies is very similar to that of conducting Quantitative Risk Assessment (QRA) studies, ultimately determining the hazards, and resulting risk associated with the activity/process in question. However, not all fallen objects or swinging loads will result in perforation of the equipment or facility under review, hence the impact energy of such fallen objects must be determined. This will ultimately decide if such hazardous events can occur and if so, in what ways can this be mitigated to avoid the occurrence of the event.
What is the Expected Output?
On award of the study PetroPlat will issue a project Terms of Reference (ToR). This will highlight the assumptions that will be made in the study. It will also include the methodology that will be utilised as well as any further information required from the client.
Upon acceptance of the ToR, PetroPlat will conduct the analysis and prepare a DOS report. The report will describe the facility, the scope of work, include a detailed methodology, the potential frequency of dropped objects and the consequence shall be assessed. Overall risk evaluation will be carried from the results.
