AUVs Take Center Stage

For those of you who have NOT had access to electronic media for the past week (a small number, I am sure, but I’m covering all basis here) the subsea industry – specifically the Autonomous Underwater Vehicle (AUV) market … and even more specifically Bluefin Robotics – have taken center stage globally as the hunt for the remains of missing Malaysian Air flight 370 continues in earnest.

While this is evolving as one of the great missing airplane stories of our time, the marine and subsea industry have come to the forefront in the search for clues: debris from the assumed wreckage, and most hopefully the “black box.”

I turn on my news browser in the morning and I’m met with a Bluefin AUV; I run on the treadmill at the gym and on the TV screen see the Bluefin AUV. While all of this attention is presumably good for the company and the industry, it serves to highlight too the incredible work being done every day by professionals in the subsea industry, serving notice as to both the amazing capabilities as well as the limitations.

From someone embedded in the specific media serving this industry, It has been an interesting exercise to see this play out in the general media, and to hear question, comment and exasperation as to why the plane cannot be found.

Above and beyond all else, I think it serves as an indication to the important work being done within the subsea sector to make the world a smaller place, and in fact to shed light on what is the final frontier on our planet: the depths of the oceans.

http://www.marinelink.com/news/submarine-robotic-begins366954.aspx
http://www.marinelink.com/news/searching-malaysia366421.aspx
http://www.marinelink.com/news/submarine-nuclear-assists366236.aspx