DEMO: Autonomous catamaran and tethered ROV as part of a heterogeneous marine robotic system on a monitoring mission

DEMO: Autonomous catamaran and tethered ROV as part of a heterogeneous marine robotic system on a monitoring mission

Automating inspection and monitoring of harbours, marinas, and aquaculture ecosystems, including marine litter detection, is an highly relevant problem in the area of marine robotics. This demonstration aims to showcase a heterogeneous multi-robot system tackling this issue. A set of complementary platforms with a different set of capabilities and functionalities is featured: autonomous catamaran-like surface vehicles SWAMP (CNR-GENOVA) and Korkyra (UNIZG-FER) with the Blueye Pro ROV tethered to it are integrated into the Multifunctional Smart Buoy system of surface and sensor units (UNIZG-FER). The autonomous surface vehicle (ASV) Korkyra is developed as a catamaran to provide better stability and hydrodynamic properties and is made of aluminum for increased robustness. It has a modular design allowing integration of various payloads such as Blueye Pro ROV. Furthermore, the autonomy of the ASV Korkyra is on average 10-11h allowing it to be used in intensive real-life inspection and monitoring missions. All agents from the above-mentioned heterogeneous robotic system form an ad-hoc communication network spanning both underwater acoustic channels and surface WiFi comms. Blueye ROV collects visual data of the seafloor with an objective to find sea litter and other pollution factors, while acoustic sensor units monitor and report on water quality. ASV Korkyra is controlled to follow the ROV. Once sea litter is detected, its estimated georeferenced location is sent to the ASV SWAMP using the Smart Buoy as a relay, after which SWAMP moves to the given location. The buoy monitors the vehicles during the entire length of the mission, displaying their telemetry and status data on a graphical dashboard.

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Tutorials are consisted of introduction presentation of 30 minutes and hands-on part of 60min. Tutorial hands-on and demos are divided in three groups which will rotate together every hour: