Adapting AUVs for use in under-ice scientific missions

Since the mid 1960's, Canadian companies and universities have been leaders in the development of unmanned underwater vehicles and sensing systems. Over the same period, there has been increasing interest in the use of the Arctic, both as an ocean waterway and as a source of natural resources and food. In support of these objectives, scientific studies and research to characterize the Arctic environment are being initiated with increasing frequency. With an Arctic landmass second only in area to that of Russia, Canada has a major interest in the focus and impact of these studies, and it has started to use unmanned vehicles as a platform to aid in the collection of polar ocean data. The paper review the experience gained on Arctic operations and outline the considerations and decisions that were made to adapt AUV technology and procedures for the Arctic mission. Both pre-deployment and operational aspects was covered. Pre-deployment aspects that was presented include training, fail safe provisions, mission planning and simulation, the use of local knowledge or lore, mission logistics and finally, loss provisions and insurance coverage for the vehicle. Operational aspects to be discussed was include dealing with extremely cold, ice-surface temperatures, high latitude, inertial initialization and navigation, under-ice acoustic positioning, communications with the AUV, acoustic homing to the recovery site and the procedures for recovery. Procedures for turning the vehicle around between missions, including options for battery charging, data down and mission upload, was also presented. The paper demonstrated that the technology and procedures needed to operate AUVs successfully in polar regions have been demonstrated to work and are readily available to the scientific researcher. The paper also highlight the need for a thorough AUV training program ahead of the polar deployment.