Ergonomic considerations in marine evacuation system design and employment

Drover, Danika (2006) Ergonomic considerations in marine evacuation system design and employment. Masters thesis, Memorial University of Newfoundland.

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Abstract

This thesis reports on three studies completed in the area of marine safety. The first study focused on the compatibility between the anthropometric characteristics of persons employed in the offshore oil industry in Newfoundland and liferaft and lifeboat evacuations systems employed in the offshore. Findings from this study suggest that manufacturers should consider shoulder breadth, rather than hip breadth measurements as a better criterion for determining seat design and lifesaving appliance occupancy capacities. Furthermore, the typical morphological features of a typical person employed in the Newfoundland offshore are considerably larger than the standards used in the type approval process. This study concludes that testing standards should be reconsidered. The second study assessed the requirements for measuring forces and accelerations acting on humans engaged in marine evacuation systems such as chutes and slides. While no subjects reported pain or injury due to these tasks, the upper limits of loading recorded might have the potential to injure a younger, older or less-fit person. The study concludes that manufacturers should be aware of human tolerance limits when developing evacuations systems. The third study consisted of the measurement of egress times for injured or physically challenged users of marine evacuation systems. Data from the study reported it takes on average 89.3s and a maximum of 129.8s for a mannequin loaded stretcher to descend through a slide and be placed into its final position in the raft. Throughout the trials, mannequins experienced head accelerations of approximately 2 Gs. There was a general trend that heavier stretchers seemed to better secure/restrain the mannequin and resulted in smaller accelerations during the descent. This thesis provides considerable guidance to regulatory bodies and manufacturers in the development, testing and deployment of marine evacuation systems.

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