Remus

Just because I am staying home and modelling these days, doesn't mean everyone is. In fact, some members of our Stellwagen team have been busy in the field. We did the vast majority of the field work for our Stellwagen Telepresence Project (you know, the one with all the shipwrecks) this summer with remotely-operated vehicles Pixel and PPE. We brought our audiences live to the sanctuary with telepresence in August, but one objective remained: find new shipwrecks. 

Recovering REMUS at sea. Photo by Sean Whelan.

You see, when we submitted the proposal for the Stellwagen project, we were planning to use sonar to survey the seafloor in the northeast corner of the sanctuary while we were at sea for telepresence. That didn't happen this year, thanks to covid, so we adopted a different strategy. We partnered with REMUS.

REMUS stands for Remote Environmental Monitoring UnitS, and they're a class of autonomous underwater vehicle (AUV). If you're not familiar with REMUS, I highly recommend you check out this SharkCam video (it's totally awesome). AUVs are amazing tools for locating shipwrecks, and the REMUS team has extensive experience doing just that. 

Dolphins near the bow of the Tioga. Photo by Sean Whelan.

Three members of the REMUS team headed out on WHOI's research vessel Tioga and have been collecting side-scan sonar imagery of the seafloor over the past week. It's extremely exciting (and a bit nerve-wracking) for me to hear about their progress and see the results remotely. Photos, videos, and messages show up in my inbox with updates on their progress. Field work at sea is always challenging, and the REMUS team is battling high wind, waves, and cold temperatures - the best that New England autumn has to offer. 

Despite the challenges, the results look great so far. REMUS has passed over several known shipwreck sites in the sanctuary, and the engineers are combing through the data to find any previously-undocumented wrecks.

As an extra bonus, they saw dolphins! I'm extremely grateful to Amy, Sean, and the rest of the REMUS team. With any luck, we will have new shipwrecks to go explore in the future!