Seabed asset location demonstrations
Subsea Asset Location Technologies Ltd (SALT) successfully demonstrated its SonarBell technology at ABP Southampton recently.
The invited audience included marine survey companies, government marine related agencies, engineering and environmental consultants, archaeologists and marine equipment manufacturers and suppliers.
SonarBell is an inert, stable and totally passive device for marking and locating any asset on the seabed or in the water column. It is omni-directional, requires no maintenance, ranges in size from 50mm to 200mm and is visible for up to 2km, depending on the frequency and power of the sonar. SonarBell is easily deployed in depths of water to 300m to mark assets that need to be monitored, repaired or recovered. The technology is innovative, easy to use and is less expensive to purchase and deploy than traditional battery powered and active transponder systems.
The demonstration days started with presentations by SALT CEO, Dr Andy Tulloch, about Subsea Asset Intelligent Location Systems (SAILS) to enable guests to gain an understanding of the technology and its application in the wider survey, fisheries, offshore energy, regulatory and environmental sectors. SALT CTO, Carl Tiltman gave an outline presentation on the SonarBelltechnology and its capabilities, followed by practical demonstrations in Southampton Water on the ABP Survey Vessel, Protector.
Despite a power boat coming close to Protector on the first day and a yacht fouling the demonstration’s mooring line on the second day, ABP’s Reson SeaBat 8101 multi-beam sonar system easily detected and indentified the array of SonarBells, which had been pre-deployed on the seabed.
Back in the classroom, each day finished with a demonstration by OceanWise MD, Dr Mike Osborne, of how, by using the SonarBell unique labelling, the sonar reflection from individual SonarBells can be transferred onto GIS for visualization and as markers within a comprehensive asset management system.
