A coupled ALE-FEM framework for simulating ice-floe drift and impact loads on rigid oil booms in Arctic waters

Global warming is fragmenting Arctic ice cover into floe fields, increasing both maritime traffic and oil-spill risks in ice-infested waters, yet boom performance under flowing-water conditions remains poorly understood. This study develops a coupled FEM–ALE numerical model in LS-DYNA, treating ice floes and booms as Lagrangian rigid bodies and water–air flow on an Eulerian mesh, thereby explicitly capturing the squeeze-film effect and FSI energy dissipation neglected by dry-collision models. Parametric simulations over current velocities of 0.05–0.15 m/s, ice concentrations of 30–60%, and four floe sizes show that interception efficiency stays at 100% for large floes but drops to as low as 50% in concentrated small-floe fields, where flow acceleration around boom ends triggers lateral bypass beyond 40% concentration. Large floes generate high transient impact peaks, whereas aggregated small floes impose sustained loads nearly two orders of magnitude lower with pronounced nonlinear fluctuations. Within the tested ranges, both peak and sustained ice loads increase with current velocity and ice concentration when interception is maintained. These findings provide a mechanical basis for the anti-ice design of Arctic spill-response booms.