What is this door for ?!

probably so some one can see that side of the boat while docking.......architects don't make it easy....
not really , it's the latest innovation for owners or guest to shoot at flying fish while underway.....quite popular years ago..

The monkey ball is easy enough to get to the dock, but on many of them you physically cannot see the dock line you're feeding out from the hause pipe, or the amount of tension you have on it, or if the guys on the dock even have it attached to the cleat yet. It's a dumb design compared to yachts that have everything on deck and you can see through the hause pipe, clearing port, or over the hull side or all of the above as you're feeding line out or taking it in. You also cannot put the monkey ball out of the hause pipe and catch it on the other side. It is now a 2 man job just for the bow.

Yes, more people are afraid to go to sea in their 'pretty' boats, as they don't actually work very well as sea-going vessels.

Get some experience on a large vessel, while waiting to get that job read up on the correct terminology for the various parts of the vessel and equipment.

You keep calling this a stupid design or a dumb design, I couldn't disagree more.

I think the enclosed mooring deck is a very nice feature, mainly for reasons I mentioned earlier. In the pic posted in the original post, we see that the enclosed mooring deck provides a nice helideck on the bow.
The enclosed mooring deck provides a lot of protection from the elements for the crew working the anchor windlasses or engaged in mooring operations. And, there is a lot of interior space added for storage, etcetera.

And while you say this is now a 2 man job, a resourceful mate or deckhand could deploy the mooring lines from the bow alone by working smarter, not harder.

>This crewmember would start by feeding the light line (messenger line) with the monkey's fist out the hawsehole and letting enough out that they can easily snag it with a boathook. Next, take a couple of wraps so the messenger line does not keep feeding out. They would then go out onto the mooring platform door, snag the messenger line, and secure it. Next, go back into the mooring deck area and make sure the bitter end of the messenger line is secured to the mooring line.
>Now, feed out enough of the mooring line so that the loop of the mooring line and a few feet extra are hanging down outside the hawsehole. Next, go back to the mooring platform door, coil up the messenger line in a smart and efficient manner, and throw the monkey's fist to the line handlers waiting patiently on the dock. (Try not to bean them in the head with the "monkey ball".)
>Once the line handlers have safely retrieved the monkey's fist and taken up the slack in the messenger line, start feeding the mooring line out through the hawsehole. And yes, while you cannot physically see the dock line as it is being fed out, you can get a good feeling for how it is being taken up by the line handlers, and a bit of common sense coupled with good judgement should help indicate when you have paid out enough mooring line to know when the guys on the dock have attached it to the cleat. If you are unsure, you can always secure the mooring line, and go look out the open door of the mooring platform to see how much more line is needed.
>Once enough line has been paid out, and the line handlers have secured the line to the dock and are now standing well clear, you can take up on the mooring line until you have it tensioned up how you want it. Go look out the door again to make sure all is well, and Bob's your uncle.

Now, on a boat the size of the one posted in the original picture, I would imagine they operate under a Safety Management System as prescribed by ISM Code. As such, there would hopefully have been a risk analysis done with a Job Safety Analysis, and pre-job meeting involving all crew members involved in the mooring operation.
In such a meeting, the steps of the job would be discussed and analyzed, and a safety issue with a crew member working alone in the bow mooring deck area would be identified. Designating this as a 2 man job would help mitigate the risk, and the work flow would progress much as I described above, but with 2 crewmembers working together as opposed to one.

As these boats increase in size it does not take much for many one man jobs on a small boat to require a second set of hands and some muscle to perform. The loads on mooring lines of 50m plus boats are such that many times snubbing lines are needed to release the line from the capstan drum and get it on the bollard. This is why many bollards have rings welded into their bases to secure the snubbing line.

ISM SMS, PSC are all alien things to many of the readers and posters here so don't be surprised if you get a serve for talking about boats that don't belong here.

Thank you.

This is yet another example of a chronic and growing problem. The OP came in with a very good question that many other readers have probably wondered about.

It is a real shame that he was answered with opinion and lame jokes instead of real information. The opinion was not even based on knowledge of or experience with the configuration shown. How can anyone who has never been involved in a mooring evolution with that configuration heap such ill-informed criticism? Why would anyone even feel a need to post?

Thanks K1W1 and CaptPKilbride for posting useful information.

On boats of the size that use an enclosed mooring station, that design enhances safety by eliminating the practice of having deckhands hanging over the rail trying to capture a line threaded through a hawse by another deckhand lying on the deck. It provides a dry and relatively uncluttered deck for the windlass and winch operator out of the wind and weather. Vessels large enough to incorporate that design usually have a large enough deck gang to assign enough trained hands to operate the machinery and communicate with the bridge. It is not the one man band style event common on a small boat with a 2 man crew. It is a design used on many ships and is now the norm for cruise ships. It keeps the foredeck clear, it allows room for a heliport or rescue boat garage. It reduces maintenance overhead caused by exposure to seawater and sunlight.

It is a great idea and is incorporated on large yachts by designers who know they can enhance deck safety, operational efficiency, and styling at the same time.

Thanks

"Big boats" provide room for bigger and better ideas.

But is it really safer. I beg to differ. You're standing on a platform not any wider than a diving board most of the time 20-40' above the water or dock. The few I've seen up close, it's equivalent to standing on the end of a passerelle 40' over the water. You don't have anything secure to lean against when pulling on very heavy lines when working out there besides a 1/2" or so rope going around at waist level. It's also something else to go wrong, what if the hydraulics for the door fail and it won't open? It is not like standing on the deck and leaning against the hull side.

You don't see these on commercial ships.

On commercial ships you see self tensioning mooring winches, the only lines man handled by the docking crew are the heaving lines.

The only lines the guy on the platform will handle whilst there are heaving lines. The docking team will be pulling them in once they are secured to the dock lines or paying out their own lines if they are being used. There is or should be no heavy line handling done from the platform

On vessels that are big enough to require these doors there are a raft of rules and regulations as to what they have to support and how secure the rails etc need to be.

I did a FAT on a set of these last week. They had solid handrails that fold up as the door opens, the platform had to support 1.5 tons on the end with no deflection.

The properly designed and implemented ones are far from fashion accessories or ***** enhancements.

They will normally be found on professionally run vessels with suitable qualified crew and a safety regime in place as per the SMS and ISM which along with just about anything else onboard can be asked to be demonstrated during a PSC.

As the great bard Jimmy Buffett once said:
"Don't try to describe a KISS concert if you've never seen one"

Here is a commercial ship with these doors:
http://www.shipsandharbours.com/picture/number15181.asp

They climb up the chain to spy on what we're eating for supper?

I have no issue with the mooring boardwalks if they have a solid handrail around them. Something you can really lean against, if you're docking in adverse conditions. The few I've seen had the Opecare style poles that raised up and dockline as sort of a half assed handrail.