Remotely operated underwater vehicle

A Remotely Operated Vehicle (ROV; German remotely operated vehicle ) is a cable- led underwater vehicle for applications in science, industry and the military.

Description

ROVs are mainly used in the oil industry. Maintenance, inspection and other work in the offshore area are now performed largely in place by divers or manned submersibles of ROVs. This makes it possible to dive much deeper and be more active under water, than would be possible with divers. Compared with manned boats they are not only risk-free, but especially cheaper to use, since better use of space is possible, for example, by waiving the life support systems.

While ROVs with a cable connection (English umbilical literally, umbilical cord ') are connected to the energy and information transmission to a surface vessel, come Autonomous Underwater Vehicles ( AUV ), without such a cable to connect to and manage their energy storage in batteries with it. Both solutions have their pros and cons and serve different purposes. ROVs and AUVs are Outwardly easy to distinguish. ROVs are usually frame or frames, which are equipped with different components, and bear a variety of propellers (English thruster ) to maneuver in all directions. In contrast, AUVs with its driving energy to be economical and are therefore covered with a low resistance formed outer skin such as submarines or torpedoes. AUVs are exposed to research vessels to sample the world's oceans and dive programmed into the depths to collect scientific or survey data. After a predetermined time they reappear and transmit this data via satellite to a research station. The data acquisition cycle is repeated as long until the AUV ends the job and then "captured" is.

ROVs are available in many different designs and classes, such as Micro ROVs, mini ROVs, Work -class ROVs, multi-role ROV (multi-function ) and Trencher ( grave flushing for submarine installations ). Smaller ROVs are usually purely electrically and larger are operated electro-hydraulically. Micro ROVs weigh from 1.5 pounds, including camera, drives and lights. Trenchersysteme can to 20 tonnes. Another example of an ROV operates the Dutch company Boskalis Dredging. Having to move the gripper, equipped with propellers to excavate a larger area on the sea floor without the ship (purpose: protecting offshore installations before icebergs grind over ground). This example illustrates that AUVs can not necessarily be regarded as a better alternative to ROVs by their related intervention.

Examples

• The Japanese ROV Kaiko appeared in 1995 in the Mariana Trench is the first ROV to the deepest point of the sea onto 10911.4 m.
• The Scorpio 45 is a diving robot, who achieved in August 2005 in the liberation of a manöverierunfähigen Russian submarine Pris the class before the Kamchatka Peninsula celebrity.
• Another named Snoop Dog came in 1995 for the film Titanic for the first time in the premises of the sunken Titanic in 1912 and made such incomparable recordings.
• The oil spill in the Gulf of Mexico variety of types were in use.
• In January 2012, an ROV, inter alia, for the search for missing the Costa Concordia was used.