A Fleet of Unpowered Submarines Is About to Plumb the Ocean’s Depths

Even though they cover two-third’s of the planet’s surface, we know precious little about how the oceans actually interact with the continents and atmosphere. What’s more, our oceanic models are woefully incomplete-only capable of showing large areas with reduced resolution or in high detail over a limited area. But a new fleet of autonomous research submarines are about to rectify that problem…These 16 gliders were built as part of Rutgers University’s Challenger mission to explore and quantify deep ocean currents and provide researchers a means of testing existing oceanic models for accuracy against the collected data. Each UUV (unmanned underwater vehicle) measures just over seven feet long and utilizes buoyancy changes within the water column to propel it along at speeds of 21 miles per day.