Deep sea qualification of remotely operable vehicle (ROSUB 6000)

A deepwater work class remotely operable vehicle (ROV) namely ROSUB 6000 is developed at National Institute of ocean technology, Chennai, India. ROSUB6000 is an unmanned, free swimming underwater vehicle that has six degrees of freedom. ROUSB 6000 system is controlled from a technology demonstration vessel (TDV) Sagar Nidhi. Launching and retrieval system, power house and control console containers, umbilical cable and direction changing pulley arrangement are parts of the ROSUB 6000 deck system. ROSUB 6000 subsea system comprises Tether management system, propulsion system, communication system, navigation equipments, control system, scientific sensors, robotic manipulators, cameras, lights and sampling devices as its subsystems. Deep sea qualification trials of ROSUB 6000 system were conducted at 12 & 13° N and 80 ° E during October 2009 to qualify the system for deep sea exploration and intervention tasks. Four dives at depths of 2004 (m), 2244 (m), 3044 (m) and 3050 (m) were carried out during the trials. Deep sea qualification of ROSUB 6000 system was completed successfully overcoming various challenges like umbilical cable damage, Termination hose failure etc… up to a maximum water depth of 3050 m. System performance feedback, in-situ oceanological parameters such as dissolved oxygen profiles and subsea images were recorded during trials. Push coring and dropping of Indian flag were successfully done. This paper presents in detail the challenges encountered and outcome of deep-sea qualification trial of ROSUB 6000 system.