Robotic tools for deep water archaeology: Surveying an ancient shipwreck with an autonomous underwater vehicle

Abstract

The goals of this field note are twofold. First, we detail the operations and discuss the results of the 2005 Chios ancient shipwreck survey. This survey was conducted by an international team of engineers, archaeologists and natural scientists off the Greek island of Chios in the northeastern Aegean Sea using an autonomous underwater vehicle (AUV) built specifically for high-resolution site inspection and characterization. Second, using the survey operations as context, we identify the specific challenges of adapting AUV technology for deep water archaeology and describe how our team addressed these challenges during the Chios expedition. After identifying the state-of-the-art in robotic tools for deep water archaeology, we discuss opportunities where new developments and research (e.g., AUV platforms, underwater imaging, remote sensing and navigation techniques) will improve rapid assessment of deep water archaeological sites. It is our hope that by reporting on the Chios field expedition we can both describe the opportunities that AUVs bring to fine resolution seafloor site surveys and elucidate future opportunities for collaborations between roboticists and ocean scientists.

Remote sensing for underwater archaeology: case stud-ies from Greece and Eastern Mediterranean

“…AUV-Lab, was deployed to Nisyros Island to search for an ancient shipwreck (Delaporta et al, 2002). Furthermore, Bingham et al (2010) conducted a remote sensing survey off the Greek island of Chios in the northeastern Aegean Sea using an autonomous underwater vehi-cle (AUV) built specifically for high-resolution site inspection and characterization.…”

“…Modern high-resolution multibeam echosounder covers a relatively large area around a manmade target while resolving the true threedimensional (3-D) shape of the object with centimetre-level resolution. Bingham et al (2010) collected multibeam data form an ancient shipwreck off the Greek island of Chios in the northeastern Aegean Sea. The high resolution of the bathymetric data was sufficient to reveal the detailed characteristics of the wreckage and the surrounding seafloor.…”

Intervention AUVs: The next challenge

“…During the last 20 years, AUVs have become a standard tool for mapping the seafloor using optical (Eustice et al (2006)) and acoustic (Paduan et al (2009)) sensor modalities, with applications to dam inspection (Ridao et al (2010)), marine geology (Escartín et al (2008)) and underwater archaeology (Bingham et al (2010)) to mention some but a few. After years of research, few autonomous platforms are already available in the market, most of them able to perform side scan sonar and bathymetric multi-beam surveys.…”

A Prototype of a Robotic Research Facility for Nuclear Applications

“…Currently, robotics has been successfully used in unsanitary and inhospitable environments exploration, such as: space (Katz & Some, 2003), volcanic (Muscato et al, 2003), submarine [Bingham et al, 2010), caves (Morris et al, 2006), etc. Other not less important use of robots is to substitute humans in risky situations that may affect their physical integrity, such as environment subject to chemical or nuclear exposure.…”