Investigation of alternative footing shapes to mitigate instabilities during installation of offshore drilling platforms

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Spudcan footings are used to support three legged mobile drilling rigs, exploring and extracting oil and gas in water depths of up to 150 metres. Despite efforts by the industry to minimise the risks during rig installation, punch-through incidents (i.e. unexpected rapid penetration of the footings) and bending of the leg whilst installing the spudcan next to a footprint (pockmark from previous rig installation) continue to occur at an increasing rate, causing economic loss of $5 to50 million per incident. Combining advanced physical and numerical modelling, this project aims to develop optimised spudcan shapes, and corresponding design approaches and guidelines, to mitigate these risks, ensuring safe installation of rigs in hazardous regions.