SeaTrac has used its SP-48 uncrewed surface vehicle (USV) to map potential hypoxic zones in the U.S. Gulf of Mexico as part of a project that confirmed its performance using data from
SeaTrac has used its SP-48 uncrewed surface vehicle (USV) to map potential hypoxic zones in the U.S. Gulf of Mexico as part of a project that confirmed its performance using data from a crewed vessel.
Working in partnership with the University of Southern Mississippi (USM) and NOAA’s Office of Marine and Aviation Operations (OMAO), SeaTrac sought to prove the effectiveness of an uncrewed system in gathering real-time data in these waters, while also reducing the manpower and resources used in traditional data collection methods.
Operational goals included testing and demonstrating sampling procedures for remote, 24/7, over-the-horizon operation of the USV and winch.
During the project which ran for 14 days in December 2023, personnel based in SeaTrac’s Marblehead, Mass., operation center remotely piloted the SP-48.
Throughout its time at sea, the USV relayed collected data from the sonde and other sensors over available cellular and satellite connections to servers at USM for real-time quality assurance.
Simultaneously, USM and NOAA collected data via a crewed vessel along several sampling sites to compare and validate data collected by the SP-48.
The SeaTrac SP-48 USV was configured with a deep keel and redundant satellite communications for offshore operations. It was fitted with an AML-3
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