Kraken Robotics has provided sonar and laser scanning technologies for ThayerMahan and the National Oceanographic and Atmospheric Administration’s (NOAA) joint operations.
This follows a Cooperative Research and Development Agreement (CRADA) signed between Kraken and NOAA as well as Kraken’s strategic partnership signed with ThayerMahan, both in 2018.
The demonstration, taking place onboard NOAA’s ship Okeanos Explorer, will conclude on August 01, 2019.
NOAA’s Office of Ocean Exploration and Research (OER) and its partners, will conduct a technology demonstration using Kraken’s sonar and laser scanning technologies off the east coast of the United States, from Virginia to Rhode Island.
The demonstration will test new and emerging technologies and evaluate how existing technologies could be integrated into NOAA operations.
The primary objectives of this demonstration are to test, integrate, and evaluate emerging and existing technologies for potential use in meeting the data requirements of OER, its partners, and the larger oceanographic research community.
The secondary objective of this demonstration is to provide authoritative and actionable data to regional stakeholders. New technologies and novel integrations such as those being tested during the mission are expected to aid and accelerate the fulfillment of the NOAA Office of Ocean Exploration and Research (OER) objective to map and characterize the U.S. Exclusive Economic Zone by 2030.
The 2019 Technology Demonstration operations will also include mapping and remotely operated vehicle dives. The expedition will be broken into two legs.
Leg 1 operations will include the deployment of a REMUS 600 Autonomous Underwater Vehicle (AUV) in partnership with the NOAA Office of Coast Survey (OCS) and a towed Kraken Robotics KATFISH with Synthetic Aperture Sonar in partnership with Kraken Robotics and ThayerMahan.
Targets for testing these systems will focus on the U.S. northeast continental shelf and will include areas with limited bathymetric coverage, Underwater Cultural Heritage sites (UCH), and sites that were identified in the 2013 NOAA report, “Risk Assessment for Potentially Polluting Wrecks in U.S. Waters” . These systems will be deployed in concert with the Okeanos Explorer’s suite of deep water mapping systems.
During Leg 2, NOAA will test the integration of three technologies with OER’s ROV Deep Discoverer. These technologies include a 360-degree camera being developed at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, a One-Way Travel-Time Inverted Ultra-Short Baseline navigation system from the Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution, and a Kraken Robotics SeaVision 3D underwater laser scanner.