Risk Assessment of Immersed Tube Tunnel Construction

Round 1

Reviewer 1 Report

This paper is on an important topic. However, the presentation of the topic is unclear. There are many doubts about how the information has been presented. Some major concerns are:

Clarify the purpose of the cloud model and how was it used. It would be better for authors to introduce it to the reader as from the cloud a reader would think it is something related to cloud computing whereas it seems more like a computation-based visualization technique.

The genetic algorithm was used and mentioned in the text but was not mentioned in the Abstract.

The term 4M1E was not properly explained.

In Figure 1, it is mentioned the Experts evaluate various. But it is not mentioned what is included in various.

The purpose of using AHP GA should be explained. The theoretical procedure was mentioned but how GA was used with AHP is not clear. For example what tools/software is used? 

The SMART principle was not explained. How it was used to identify risks.

Figure 2 is more like a Table than a Figure. 

The term entropy is famous in the thermodynamics domain. however, its meaning in the domain of this paper should be clarified.

A range of Risk scores has been described in the paper but it is not clear where this range has come from.

It appears that two types of Expert surveys/opinions were sought. It has not been clearly mentioned. One survey seems to get the pairwise comparisons for AHP. But it is not clear what the other survey was for in which 126 questionnaires were issued. The details for the selection are missing. 

In Section 2.3 Low-Risk category name has been used twice. 

Where did the data for Figure 4 come from? 

The cloud charts in Figure 5 could alternative shown with trend lines to better show the location of evaluation results. 

Author Response

Please see the attachment.

Author Response File: Author Response.docx

Reviewer 2 Report

For assessing risk factors, it is very important to evaluate the risks based on their probability of occurrences as well as the impacts on more than one objective such as construction process or cost of construction not only one objective.  The effect of probability and impacts should be combined to give reliable results. For example, a low risk factor during construction may have high probability or have a high impact on cost or any another objective. Furthermore, there are many other risks the authors did not take into consideration, So they need to identify more risk factors in their case

Author Response

Please see the attachment.

Author Response File: Author Response.docx

Round 2

Reviewer 1 Report

The reviewer appreciates the authors addressing and answering the questions raised in the first review report. Most of the questions asked in the previous version were answered appropriately. There are some further queries.  

For the question about how AHP was used with GA, the answer is still not clear. Figure 2 explains the flow chart of the process. However, it is not clear how was it implemented in MATLAB. A sample code of MATLAB should be presented so that reader could verify the results.

The establishment of pairwise comparison matrices U, U1 to U6 should be explained. These comparisons were based on 10 experts’ opinions. How were those 10 responses aggregated?

It is normal to have inconsistency in pairwise comparison responses. These consistencies could easily be removed manually by changing the pair scores or with a consensus approach in the Delphi method. Only U4 and U5 were inconsistent. Why then there is a need to use GA to obtain consistency?

Moreover, consistent pairwise matrices should also be produced to see how the inconsistent matrices changed.

Please clarify the network questionnaire survey. Was it mainly used for risk identification? What questions were asked and how the results were aggregated to produce the list of risks in Table 1?

Compare the results of the cloud model with simple evaluated results from the AHP approach to highlight the need for the use of the cloud model.

This paper is missing a conclusions section. The Results section appears to be a conclusions section.

 

Besides using a proper format for references and placement of Table headings. 

Author Response

Please see the attachment.

Author Response File: Author Response.docx

Reviewer 2 Report

the authors answer for my comments sufficiently while I hope from them to present their explanations for the point of using probability with impacts on objectives  adequately within the research

Author Response

Please see the attachment.

Author Response File: Author Response.docx