New Endurance AUV

[Tamara Thomsen]

The New Endurance AUV was launched today on the UW-Madison campus.  We (Diversions Scuba) were hired by the National Geographic film crew to support their dives.  It was cool to be part of something so amazing - although our participation was so small as compared to all others involved. 

The Endurance was built in part by renowned explorer Bill Stone () in cooperation with several partner universities.  This AUV is being taken to Antarctica in November to dive under the ice on its first mission, and then in 2017 she will be put down on Europa to explore the frozen seas.

I have attached a few pics from today's dives.  You may recognize Ethan Brodsky - tending line, and Diversions’ manager, Isaac Gomez - support diver. 

[ethanb]

ENDURANCE being lifted from the parking lot and down to the water:

They had a 90 ton crane to lift it, but the vehicle was heavy enough that they couldn't extend the boom very far out, so the hole had to be fairly close to shore.  We're barely at the minimum depth range for the vehicle - maximum depth is 1000 meters.

Bill Stone preparing to connect the fiber optic cable for communication to the control room:
[img]http://lh6.google.com/ethan.brodsky/R7Ig5_p0JQI/AAAAAAAAMe8/kVpfFJK3y8M/s400/IMG_7307.jpg"[/img]
Once the vehicle checks out, it will go into an entirely autonomous operation mode and will do eight-hour survey dives without operator intervention before return to base. 

Adam, the National Geographic cinematographer, prepares to get in the water to film the vehicle's first dive. 
[img]http://lh3.google.com/ethan.brodsky/R7Ig7Pp0JTI/AAAAAAAAMfY/GdTXGEjShGI/s400/IMG_7310.jpg"[/img]

Here the vehicle is lifted out of the water after its first "dive":


Close up of the vehicle:
[img]http://lh5.google.com/ethan.brodsky/R7IhFvp0JmI/AAAAAAAAMh0/OTV9EdSh-tg/s400/IMG_7329.jpg"[/img]

Later in the week, it is planned for the vehicle to do some fully autonomous dives where it leaves the hole, travels around under the ice on its own, and then returns to the hole. 

The project is sponsored by NASA and is a collaboration between UIC (University of Illinois - Chicago), Montana State University, and Stone Aerospace.  I think that Carnegie Mellon was involved too in an earlier version of the robot, DEPTHX, which explored a deep cave in Mexico.  The AUV, called ENDURANCE (for "Environmentally Non-Distributing Under-ice Robotic Antarctic Explorer) is scheduled to explore Lake Bonney, a 130 foot deep lake in Antarctic that has been under 12-15 feet of ice more or less forever.  In the end, they want to Europa (yes, Jupiter's moon), to explore the oceans underneath its ice crust.

I have a photo gallery with more images here:


More about the project:

[ethanb]

Some news coverage is online here:

NBC15:
[video]


Channel 3000:


Wisconsin State Journal:


The Capital Times:


National Public Radio:


Astrobiology Magazine:



Chicago Tribune:


Scientific American:


TIME:

[dive1dennis]

Very cool!
I heard about this project on the local radio station this morning. I guessed right away that you folks at Diversion's must have been involved!

[ethanb]

I had a pretty funny situation yesterday afternoon where one of my friends calls my cell to tell me that "there is something going out on the lake that [I'd] be really interested in and [ I ] should come over to see it.  They are using a crane to put this orange vehicle in the water and it looks like some people are going ice diving as well."    I looked around and saw the person on shore talking on a cell phone, then suggested he look a bit to his right for the guy waving his arm next to the ice diving hole.  He wasn't particularly surprised to find me out there...

Ethan

[jasondbaker]

Awesome story and pictures, thanks for sharing.  Did anyone suggest how this type of vehicle could break through the ice crust on Europa?  I would think that they would need a way to drill or melt the ice.

[ethanb]

The crust is likely miles think.  I think one of the ideas is to use "mole digging" or "inchworm digging", where the vehicle would melt a shaft and it'd refreeze up above it.  It'd trail a small cable behind it for communication with the surface.  Speculation is that nuclear power would be used to generate the heat and power the device.  I can't find anything about it, but this article about doing Lake Vostok is fairly interesting:
 

[Tamara Thomsen]

If any of you are in or around Madison, they are going to dive the robot again between 1 PM and 5 PM today.  Just go down to the Lake Mendota lakeshore just west of the Memorial Union Terrace (at the bitter end of Park Street) and look for the big crane in front of the Limnology building. 

Correction:  They are having a problem with one of the systems, so they have pushed back the dive time to 3PM

[Gary]

You guys always get to play with all that cool stuff. I'd love to come and watch but we're getting a ton of snow up here today....not a great day for a drive!! By the way, how did they happen to choose  Madison as the test site? Wasn't the AUV built at and tested at the company's "home office?" Why drag it all the way to Wisconsin? Anyway...keep up the good work, have fun, stay warm and be safe.
Gary

[ethanb]

They wanted to test it in cold water and under the ice prior to the trip to Antarctica.  Stone Aerospace is based in Texas, so I doubt they could find any frozen lakes there.  I would be surprised if they hadn't done testing in a chilled environment down there, but they have been having some problems with certain components, so maybe they ran out of time.  Having been involved in prototype vehicle projects before, I know how much gets done in a rush at the last minute and it's not unusual to miss out on a lot of testing you've planned to do.  I think it's great that they have it ready to test here now.  I am not sure why they didn't test it in Chicago, but perhaps it was easier and cheaper to get permits and the conditions in Lake Mendota are a lot more controlled than Lake Michigan or the Chicago River or something...  They want to do some runs where it leaves the hole and autonomously under the ice and Mendota is a pretty safe spot for that.

Ethan