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The Nautilus

The engine and etc put out a lot of cooling water. A pilot hit a dock somewhere and made a nice mark. Mike and I felt right at home.

Hercules is the ROV that goes down and looks at stuff. It has lots of sensors and a couple of arms for picking stuff up. The yellow on top is floatation to keep it at neutral buoyancy, and upright.

A view from the Nautilus control room. When we were there, they control room and other modules were inside shipping containers. That's what they've used in the past on other ships.

Spare Anchor

Two hydraulic manipulator arms on the right side, or the front of the ROV Hercules.

The brown box on the left is a bunch of electrical connections, oil filled to withstand the 7000 psi you find 16,000 feet under the surface of the ocean. The pressure is pretty important in the design of the ROV.

The cylinder at the bottom toward the rear is the motor that drives the hydraulic pump. Above it, with the tan tubes going in, you can see part of another cylinder. This one is a general purpose pressure vessel for electronics and other things that don't like high pressure. At the top you can see propellers to move the ROV forward, backward, left, and right. There are a couple more for up and down.

Hercules ROV - The pump and pressure vessel.

Hercules ROV - Hydraulic valves for the propellers, manipulator arms, and other motion.

Hercules ROV - The transformer is inside here. The power supply from the ship is 2400vac. This allows smaller power cable and less voltage drop over a 3 mile cable. Hercules equipment generally operates at 24vdc.

Hercules ROV - Hydraulically driven propellers. In case you haven't noticed, the ROV is not very streamlined. It goes slow.

Hercules ROV - One of three? propellers for up and down.

Hercules ROV

Hercules ROV - The main camera. It moves hydraulically.

Hercules ROV - Lights, camera

Hercules ROV - A manipulator arm. The chain is for ballast -- they can throw it off in case they need to load something. The cylinder below and to the left of the camera is the intertial navigation system.

Hercules ROV - This is the inertial navigation system. It uses a gyrocompass and motion sensors to keep track of its position. GPS doesn't work even a few inches of sea water at all, and a magnetic compass is not very accurate.

Hercules ROV

Hercules ROV - There is a small camera above these sensors so they can be monitored on the ship.

Hercules ROV

Hercules ROV

Hercules ROV - Oil-filled electrical connection box.

Argus ROV

The Hercules ROV is lowered directly from the ship. The Hercules is attached to Argus.

Argus ROV

Argus ROV

Towed side-scan sonar

High resolution towed side-scan sonar

This is the winch that lowers the ROVs. The cable has power and fiber optic (I assume) lines inside the steel jacket.

Hercules ROV - These wires are going into the general pressure vessel. The rubber jackets must compress down against the wires at depth.

The Nautilus

Getting ready to launch Hercules ROV

Hercules ROV in the water

Argus ROV data

Argus and Hercules near the bottom. The left image on the bottom row shows the instruments on Hercules. The third image on the bottom row shows Hercules from a camera on Argus.

Hercules on the bottom, from a camera on Argus.

Hercules on the bottom, from a camera on Argus.

These are amphoras from about 1200 years ago, if I remember right. They discovered this wreck the day we arrived in Turkey. It's in about 1500 feet of water.

These are amphoras from about 1200 years ago, if I remember right. They discovered this wreck the day we arrived in Turkey. It's in about 1500 feet of water.

These are amphoras from about 1200 years ago, if I remember right. They discovered this wreck the day we arrived in Turkey. It's in about 1500 feet of water.

The two red dots are from parallel lasers 10 cm apart, used for measurement.

The two red dots are from parallel lasers 10 cm apart, used for measurement.

Argus is kind of like the mother ship of Hercules. The larger Hercules is attached to Argus, which normally stays above and fairly close to Hercules. The ship is attached dircetly to Argus.

Hercules ROV - Recovery

Hercules ROV - Recovery

Some people from "60-minutes" were interested in the Nautilus.

Some people from "60-minutes" were interested in the Nautilus.