Featured Article: Autonomous Survey Vessel Increases Efficiency

Mobile Dredging & Video Pipe was recently featured in an article in International Dredging Review Magazine. Below is a snippet from the article:

Autonomous Survey Vessel Increases Efficiency on MDVP’s Portable Dredging Projects

By: Judith Powers

Mobile Dredging & Video Pipe Inc. (MDVP) of Chester, Pennsylvania, purchased a Seafloor Systems EchoBoat-ASV last September. Referring to the ASV as a “drone boat”, Project Manager Stephen Simpson said that the company used it on three projects in the remaining four months of 2017 and is posted to make wide use of it in 2018.

“The drone boat allows us to quickly and efficiently collect accurate survey data throughout an entire dredge project in a cost-effective manner, while preventing over-dredging and keeping projects on schedule,” said Simpson.

The company does maintenance dredging and environmental improvement projects in locations where portable equipment is a must.

The EchoBoat ASV is an autonomously controlled hydrographic survey platform designed for use in hard-to-access areas. The compact, lightweight EchoBoat is easy to deploy to any job site. A two-person team can transport it in a pickup truck to the water’s edge and life approximately 100-pound unit between them and set it down in the water.

The boat is made from non-corrosive materials for use in fresh or salt water. Survey equipment installed on the boat includes a Pico BM multibeam system, Automap, HYPACK (including Hypack Survey and Dredgepack), an Applanix 115 Inertial Guidance System and Valeport sound velocity probe. Transducers are mounted in alcoves under the bottom deck. It is equipped with dual-DC thrusters in an internal plug-and-play survey deck for installing the sonar and navigation monitoring equipment.

Simpson uses a remote control and his laptop from a nearby position on shore or in a small boat. The data are collected on the EchoBoat and offloaded to the laptop at the end of the survey.