USS recently teamed up with The Port of London (PLA) Hydrographic department to support University College London’s (UCL) IHO CAT A course in Hydrographic Surveying. Having supported the University for many years by providing lectures in current Hydrographic techniques and equipment as well as supporting their student field projects, The PLA, in conjunction with USS and UCL, devised a two-week schedule which incorporated a combination of manned and unmanned survey tasks to bring the very latest industry solutions to MSc students.

“USVs  have a key role to play in the future of surveying” says John Dillon-Leetch, Port Hydrographer at the Port of London Authority.  He went on to say “With the same sonar system technology as fitted to our larger surveying vessels, Maplin and Thame but at a fraction of the size of the size, this remote unmanned vessel can access areas that weren’t accessible before to this level of survey capability, changing the way we survey the riverbed. It is battery powered so releases no carbon emissions and is robust enough to work in rough offshore and coastal conditions.”

With the final element of this year’s support having  to be conducted virtually, students received daily interactive broadcasts from the Hydrographic teams aboard the PLA manned vessels M/V Maplin and M/V Thame and were able to use remote access to onboard systems to direct and participate in the project work.

During the final week of operations, the students were also able to remotely pilot USS’s Accession 350 Unmanned Surface Vessel (USV) and send it off on pre-programmed survey missions to gather high resolution bathymetry.  As future hydrographic surveyors, this was a real insight into how the industry is tackling the challenges which COVID-19 is having on daily survey operations.