Results of the 1999 Naval Oceanographic Office AUV technology demonstration (AUV Fest ´99)

In November 1999, the Naval Oceanographic Office and the Naval Meteorology and Oceanography Command hosted the third annual AUV Fest in the Gulf of Mexico north of Ship Island, MS. The participants were several AUV research groups funded by the office of Naval Research. The vehicles were from Florida Atlantic University, Lockheed-Perry Corp., Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution, the Naval Postgraduate School, and the Autonomous Undersea Systems Institute. The demonstrations consisted of a series of exercises and tasks designed to test the ability of these vehicles to collect military and scientific oceanographic data. These missions included near-shore rapid environmental assessment and mine detection, the results of these demonstrations are presented from the navy viewpoint of using the AUV as a practical tool for data collection for operational support