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Deepseawaters
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Sea ExplorationsAUVfest
2008
AUVfest 2008: Navy Mine-Hunting Robots help NOAA Explore Sunken History
 AUVfest
2008 is a unique opportunity to demonstrate and test the applications
of autonomous underwater vehicles, or AUVs, for both mine
countermeasures and archaeological research. In total, 13
AUV systems are participating in the missions, which will
take place in Rhode Island's Narragansett Bay. AUVfest 2008
is hosted by and based at The Naval Undersea Warfare Center
in Newport, Rhode Island. The Office of Naval Research and
NOAA's Office of Ocean Exploration and Research are both sponsoring
the event.
AUVs
are unmanned, underwater robots akin to the Exploration Rover
NASA uses on Mars. AUVs operate independent of humans, using
their sensors to create maps of the ocean floor, record environmental
information, and sense what humans have left behind. In military
applications, such as hunting for underwater mines, AUVs can
literally save lives. Since World War II, more U.S. Navy ships
have been damaged or lost due to mines than all other causes
combined. The Office of Naval Research supports and develops
AUVs that can locate, classify, and neutralize underwater
mines.
 Perhaps
surprisingly, the AUVs and sensors developed for mine countermeasures
can be very useful to maritime archaeologists. Acoustic sonars,
for instance, can scan broad areas of the bottom and provide
fine-detail images of objects. Below-bottom imaging systems
can generate tomographic, or sectional, images of buried objects.
As interest grows in deep-water exploration, AUVs can play
an important role in discovering clues about human history.
One of the goals of AUVfest 2008 is to expose maritime archaeologists
to the capabilities of AUVs and sensors in finding, mapping,
and protecting shipwrecks and archaeological sites.
Through
this collaboration, both federal organizations will benefit.
NOAA archaeologists will test existing equipment, allowing
them to try AUVs in real archaeological expeditions. Technology
developers for the Navy will learn about the needs of a new
set of users, driving them to create more flexible and robust
systems. Considering both scientific and military objectives
can drive new innovations and applications. The Navy and NOAA
hope that their partnership will run deep, sustaining and
strengthening in the future.
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