Understanding when water should be considered “shallow” is becoming increasingly important as vessel efficiency, safety, and environmental performance come under greater scrutiny. By examining a broad range of hydrodynamic indicators, this research challenges the traditional reliance on depth alone and proposes a more comprehensive framework for characterising shallow-water effects, supporting improved vessel operations, route planning, and wash management.

As offshore wind development accelerates across European waters, the installation of increasingly large foundation structures is presenting new geotechnical and construction challenges. Alternative installation technologies are therefore gaining attention, with trench cutter methods offering a potential solution for sites where conventional pile driving is constrained by hard ground conditions, helping to improve the reliability and efficiency of offshore wind farm construction.

As innovative multi-hull concepts continue to emerge, designers are increasingly seeking rapid and reliable methods to evaluate performance during the earliest design stages. By applying artificial neural network techniques to resistance prediction, this study demonstrates how data-driven models can accelerate the preliminary design of Tri-SWACH vessels, offering a promising alternative to more time-consuming experimental and computational approaches.

As ships age in service, material degradation can progressively erode structural strength, even when the loss of mechanical properties appears relatively modest. By examining the long-term reduction in the yield and tensile strength of high-tensile shipbuilding steel, this study demonstrates how ageing and corrosion-related deterioration can significantly increase the probability of hull girder failure, underscoring the importance of incorporating material degradation into structural integrity assessments, maintenance planning, and lifecycle risk management.

Virtual Arrival is gaining recognition as a practical operational strategy for improving voyage efficiency by aligning ship arrival times with actual port availability. Industry discussion suggests that, beyond reducing fuel consumption, emissions, and congestion, slower transit may also lessen hull and propeller fouling associated with prolonged periods at anchor, highlighting the broader operational benefits of integrating voyage optimisation with vessel performance management.

As autonomous technologies become increasingly important in the maritime sector, dedicated research platforms are playing a crucial role in advancing underwater vehicle capabilities. The development of the Delphin2 AUV demonstrates how innovative vehicle design, autonomous navigation, and low-cost experimentation can support both operational research and workforce development, highlighting the growing significance of autonomous systems in future marine exploration, inspection, and monitoring applications.

As ships age and structural demands evolve over their service life, incorporating uncertainty into strength assessment is becoming increasingly important. This study presents a practical probabilistic approach for evaluating grillage buckling strength under compressive loading, accounting for variations in structural geometry and material properties over time. By providing results with accuracy comparable to more advanced Monte Carlo simulations, the method offers a straightforward and accessible tool for reliability-based structural assessment and lifecycle integrity management.

As fishing vessels continue to operate in increasingly demanding sea conditions, understanding susceptibility to parametric rolling remains an important aspect of safety and seaworthiness. Combining experimental testing with advanced motion simulations provides valuable insight into the mechanisms driving this potentially dangerous phenomenon, supporting the development of predictive tools that can assess roll vulnerability and severity during the early stages of vessel design.

As podded propulsion systems become increasingly common in modern vessel design, understanding how scale influences hydrodynamic performance is essential for reliable model testing and design development. Comparative experiments on differently sized propellers and pod units demonstrate consistent performance characteristics under both cavitating and non-cavitating conditions, providing valuable evidence that properly scaled testing can support accurate prediction of full-scale podded propulsor behaviour and manoeuvring performance.

Designing durable connections between superstructures and hull structures remains a persistent challenge in ship construction, particularly where conflicting strength and flexibility requirements must be balanced. By applying an advanced fatigue assessment methodology based on strain-life principles, this research demonstrates a more reliable approach to evaluating cut-ending details, supporting the development of superstructure designs with improved fatigue performance and long-term structural reliability.