Autosub6000 to explore deep undersea volcanoes as only a robot could

The UK's National Oceanography Center in Southampton is prepping to launch a new autonomous underwater vehicle (also known as a robo-sub, landlubber) capable of exploring undersea volcanoes in the Cayman Trough up to 20,000 feet deep. It'll only run for about a kilometer at a time though, so while it does have quickly replaceable lithium polymer battery packs, it still won't exactly be roaming the briny deep for months on end without human supervision. And you know how we feel about unsupervised self-directing machines.

[burntpigeonproductions @ Aug 10th 2008 7:35PM]

Full speed ahead, Mr. Parker, full speed ahead!

[andres @ Aug 10th 2008 7:47PM]

fantastic. until it sabatoges the volcano and blows us all up.
i for one do not welcome our volcano probing overlords.

[Blackstar @ Aug 11th 2008 2:34AM]

"There is hope for the future.... And when the world is ready for a new and better life, all this will someday come to pass... In God's good time."

[Mr. Fax Sender @ Aug 10th 2008 8:04PM]

I, for one, welcome our new, under-sea, volcano exploring overlords.

[Chris Macdonald @ Aug 10th 2008 8:40PM]

i see what you did there

[rock99rock @ Aug 10th 2008 8:50PM]

Did you see it the last 800 times as well?

[Indefinite Implosion @ Aug 10th 2008 10:12PM]

also, despite the oxymoron, shouldn't it be underlords
with them being quite alot lower than us and all, like 20'000ft is pretty insane...

[Jhongerkong @ Aug 10th 2008 8:35PM]

Looks like an orange nuke

[Ross @ Aug 10th 2008 8:37PM]

"And you know how we feel about unsupervised self-directing machines."

I have a feeling that there was supposed to be a link there :-)

[Darak @ Aug 10th 2008 9:00PM]

Seems to me that if it's exploring underwater volcanoes it could repower itself from geothermal energy. Cmon scientists try harder.

[klew @ Aug 10th 2008 9:17PM]

Cmon governments increase research budgets

[andres @ Aug 10th 2008 9:42PM]

cant get energy from heat when its hot all around you.

[papari @ Aug 10th 2008 9:07PM]

"It has a range of 1,000 kilometers, thanks to its lithium polymer battery packs."

Umm, that's a lot more than a kilometer. Like a thousand times more.

[andres @ Aug 10th 2008 9:43PM]

i knew that sounded like a really short distance. pretty big error there.

[rock99rock @ Aug 11th 2008 9:43AM]

Can we put THOSE in a car? Thanks.

[Bunson @ Aug 11th 2008 1:58PM]

I didn't understand why it was capable of going 20k ft down when it could only travel 1 click at a time.

Now it all makes sense.

[Rick @ Aug 10th 2008 9:47PM]

Exploring volcanoes eh? Must be made of Dolomite

[Fruition @ Aug 10th 2008 11:35PM]

Only 40%.

[Anand D @ Aug 10th 2008 9:51PM]

Looks more like a torpedo

[AlphaTeam @ Aug 10th 2008 11:54PM]

Crap ICBMs planted in volcanoes.

[topherator @ Aug 11th 2008 12:40AM]

The max depth on this thing (6,000m) isn't really that impressive. The HROV at WHOI goes something like 13,000m down. Heck, Hydroid makes a production vehicle that does 6,000. And if you look at their spec pdf, that range is at 1m/s (>2 knots (slow even by AUV standards)), and it says underneath it "The 2007 version will have 50% of this range.". The range is pretty impressive, but other than that I can't really see what all the fuss is about. There are vehicles that go deeper and do more, and are doing more interesting stuff. Sounds like the BBC doing its best to make the UK look as scientifically significant as possible. Now, the way they use individually pressure compensated battery cells to avoid a big tube is impressive, but Engadet seems to miss that completely, just doing the link to the shitty blog and not really bothering to understand what's going on.

[Steven @ Aug 11th 2008 2:36AM]

"The max depth on this thing (6,000m) isn't really that impressive."

True

"The HROV at WHOI goes something like 13,000m down."

Yes, but they'll have to dig a 2000 m hole in the Mariana Trench to test do so.

[joe blow @ Aug 11th 2008 3:31AM]

Engadget glosses over this thing because there is no iphone or EEE PC involved. Get with the program. Even their own link shows the range to be 1000km, not 1 km. Only off by a little there. But without an apple logo or ogg support, they couldn't be bothered. Not a word about battery or motor type, lighting, cameras or any sensors that may be onboard.

[topherator @ Aug 11th 2008 9:29AM]

yeah, true the Mariana trench is only about 11k deep. Poor choice of wording on my part. The HROV is supposedly rated higher, but yeah after 11k everything extra is just to add to the margins, and the FOS on these things can be lower than you'd expect.

[topherator @ Aug 11th 2008 9:39AM]

yeah, they rate it to 11,000. forget what I said.

[Steven @ Aug 11th 2008 2:31AM]

Ryan, in TFA they use SI units, why don't you leave it that way? Alternatively, convert both units.

6000 meter = ~1140 rods
1 kilometer = ~1350 double remen

[Monkey @ Aug 12th 2008 5:32AM]

It is the National Oceanography CENTRE in Southampton, not "Center".

This is a name and as such should be spelled as is. "Pearl Harbor" is never "Pearl Harbour" for the same reason.