Non-Gaussian analysis methods for planing craft motion

Unlike the traditional displacement type vessels, the high speed planing crafts are supported by the lift forces which are highly non-linear. This non-linear phenomenon causes their motions in an irregular seaway to be non-Gaussian. In general, it may not be possible to express the probability distribution of such processes by an analytical formula. Also the process might not be stationary or ergodic in which case the statistical behavior of the motion to be constantly changing with time. Therefore the extreme values of such a process can no longer be calculated using the analytical formulae applicable to Gaussian processes. Since closed form analytical solutions do not exist, recourse is taken to fitting a distribution to the data and estimating the statistical properties of the process from this fitted probability distribution. The peaks over threshold analysis and fitting of the Generalized Pareto Distribution are explored in this paper as an alternative to Weibull, Generalized Gamma and Rayleigh distributions in predicting the short term extreme value of a random process.