Teledyne Gavia is pleased to report the sale of two additional 1000m depth rated Gavia Offshore Surveyor Autonomous Underwater Vehicles (AUVs) to UTEC Survey Inc., (Houston, TX).
UTEC purchased its first Gavia AUV in August 2011 then took delivery of a second vehicle in April 2012. After honing their AUV operations over the past two survey seasons, the company decided to increase the fleet with the purchase of two further vehicles, the first delivered in October 2013, and the second system delivery due early in 2014. The UTEC Gavia AUVs are fully-equipped for geophysical surveys in near-shore environments out to 1000m.
UTEC’s Gavia AUVs have recently proven their capability in East Africa, where they have been used for a wide variety of offshore survey and inspection tasks. The vehicles are fitted with swath bathymetry, side scan sonar, sub-bottom profiler modules, as well as a depth rated camera with strobe lighting. The built-in camera allows for overlapping images which are digitally stitched together, forming a complete mosaic of the survey mission. The two most recent vehicle purchases come with the DVL aided ROVINS154 inertial navigation system module (IXBlue, France), providing a high accuracy INS in a package, that is not of US origin, so it does not automatically come under the ITAR export control regulations. All UTEC AUV INS navigation is further enhanced by the additional purchase of both USBL and LBL systems from Teledyne Benthos (Falmouth, MA), which provide aiding to the INS, enabling higher accuracy and longer endurance missions.
The Gavia AUV system is built up from interchangeable/interlocking modules, allowing each system to carry the required payload for each mission. All system modules delivered to UTEC are 100% interchangeable between vehicles. UTEC’s client base comprises of many oil majors, major contractors and engineering consultants, with a need for cost-effective high resolution bathymetry, side-scan surveys, sub-bottom profiling and optical inspection. The UTEC AUV fleet provides a viable alternative to survey missions traditionally conducted from a vessel, towed system or ROV, with enhanced safety in hazardous areas. The low logistic Gavia AUV can rapidly be transported to remote locations, and quickly be deployed by a small team in a matter of a few hours to undertake missions accurately and safely around existing infrastructure. In pipeline inspection work, the low logistics survey AUV is proving a very cost-effective alternative to the non-intervention ROV.
Arnar Steingrimsson, Director of Vehicle Sales at Teledyne Marine Systems, commented: "It is our pleasure to build and expand upon the existing relationship with UTEC Survey and we are honored to be the low logistics AUV of choice for UTEC and other commercial survey customers."
Dave Ross, Americas Regional Manager for UTEC, comments: "The addition of the INS aiding delivered by the Teledyne LBL and USBL systems enables the Gavia AUV to stay subsea for the full mission duration, and stay within known positioning tolerances. This greatly enhances the capabilities of an already mature AUV platform."