Slashdot Mirror
The First Robot To Cross the Atlantic Ocean Underwater
Hugh Pickens writes "She was at sea for 221 days, alone, often in dangerous places, and usually out of touch. Most of the time she was out of contact underwater, moving slowly up and down to depths of 600 feet, safe from ships, nets, and storms. Her predecessor had disappeared on a similar trip, probably killed by a shark. 'She was a hero,' says Rutgers University oceanographer Scott Glenn after retrieving Scarlet Knight, the 7-foot-9-inch submersible robot from the stormy Atlantic off western Spain. An engineer working for the company that made the submersible said, 'We think this will just be a precursor, like Lindbergh's trip across the Atlantic. In a decade we think it will be commonplace to have roving fleets of these gliders making transoceanic trips.' The people responsible for building, funding, and flying Scarlet hope the end of the robot's successful voyage will mark a new beginning in ocean and climate research. From its position at each surfacing — when the glider surfaced and called home via an Iridium telephone parked in its tail — researchers could calculate the net effect of currents deep and shallow. After surface currents were measured, the scientists could then make inferences about what was happening deeper in the water column. Scarlet called home to upload data to researchers three times a day. 'When we have hundreds of them, or thousands of them, it will revolutionize how we can observe the oceans,' says Jerry L. Miller, a senior policy analyst at the White House Office of Science and Technology Policy, who accompanied the research team to Spain."
HA !
Clearly our new laser-avoidance algorithms give us an advantage in the upcoming man vs. sharks-with-frikken-lasers war.
This
Scarlet Knight, the 7-foot-9-inch submersible robot from the stormy Atlantic off western Spain.
Her turn ons include long strolls along the beach at night, powerful servos, and embedded Linux. Her turn offs include shark nets and unreliable power sources. She's looking for a soul mate, but not somebody who's clingy, as she previously had a bad relationship with a Giant Squid.
... and then they built the supercollider.
Try to think of the ocean as being larger.
Nerd rage is the funniest rage.
Maybe we slashdotters can work together to remake the lyrics to Yellow Submarine for it. Draft 1:
In the town, where I was born
We made a bot, which sailed to sea
And it radioed, us of its life
In the land, of submarines
So it sailed, without the sun
Till it found, the sea of green
And it glided, beneath the waves
It's our yellow, bot submarine
We all monitor the yellow submarine ...
Yellow submarine, yellow submarine
We all monitor the yellow submarine
Yellow submarine, yellow submarine
Table-ized A.I.