Patent ID: 8408153

Claim:
A mooring system, suitable for mooring a vessel moving relative to a terminal by at least one mooring facility mounted mooring robot that includes an engaging mechanism actuatable to engage with a vessel and a moving mechanism for moving the engaging mechanism relative to said mooring facility and at least one or more emergency buffer elements suitable for absorbing the energy of an approaching vessel with kinetic energy which is in excess of that absorbable by the mooring robots in a direction toward the mooring facility, thereby to provide additional protection for the vessel, mooring facility and/or mooring robot, the emergency buffer elements being movable between a non-deployed position and a deployed position; said mooring system comprising; a) a location sensing system suitable for sensing the location of a vessel and generating a location signal corresponding to the sensed location of the vessel; b) movement calculating instructions for instructing a processor to use the generated location signal for calculating an index indicative of the movement required of at least one mooring robot in order to engage the engaging mechanism of said at least one mooring robot with the vessel without causing significant initial change in inertia of the vessel; c) movement directing instructions configured for directing a control system to control the movement of the mooring robot and the emergency buffer element(s) in accordance with the calculated index(es); d) wherein one or more selected from the movement calculating instructions and the movement directing instructions utilises the location signal to direct the processor to calculate an index indicative of one or more selected from; the velocity of said vessel relative to the terminal, the acceleration or deceleration of said vessel, the kinetic energy of said vessel, and the inertia of said vessel; and e) wherein the movement directing instructions are configured to direct the control system to move the emergency buffer element(s) to their deployed position upon detection, via the location sensing system and/or the mooring robot(s), that the vessel's kinetic energy is greater than what can be absorbed by the mooring robot(s).