USV Saildrone 1079 spent one year at sea and sailed 22,057 km
? USV Saildrone Explorer 1079 made y Saildrone Inc. has just completed a first-of-its-kind mission to remote areas of the equatorial Tropical Atlantic. Sailing 11,910 nautical miles (13, 796 miles or 22,057 km) and spending 370 days at sea, SD 1079 mission was to collect CO2 data to improve global carbon projections and help enable sustainable ocean resource management.
? “This has been a phenomenal mission,” said Richard Jenkins, Saildrone founder and CEO. “Not just by the range and endurance of SD 1079, but by the ability to take these crucial measurements in very remote parts of our oceans. Areas that are very hard to reach with traditional technologies like research ships.”
The EuroSea project, coordinated by GEOMAR Helmholtz Centre for Ocean Research Kiel, is a multi-national effort to enhance the European ocean observing and forecasting system. ?Two of EuroSea’s primary goals are to:
1️⃣ Deliver ocean observations and forecasts that will advance scientific knowledge about ocean climate, marine ecosystems, and their vulnerability to human impacts;
2️⃣ demonstrate how the ocean is an essential part of an economically viable and healthy society—not only today but for decades to come.
?Saildrone’s 2021-2022 EuroSea mission was led by GEOMAR Helmholtz Centre for Ocean Research Kiel, along with the Observatoire Océanologique de Villefranche-sur-Mer (LOV), Institut de recherche pour le développement (IRD), Euro-Argo RI, and Brazil’s Federal University of Pernambuco (UFPE) and Universidade do Estado do Rio de Janeiro (UERJ).
Under the FAIR data principles of making scientific data findable, accessibly, interoperable, and available for reuse, the data collected during Saildrone’s EuroSea mission will be available through the Copernicus Marine Service, EMODnet, and SeaDataNet portals.
⚙️ USV Saildrone Explorer specifications:
LOA – 7 m
Wing – 5 m
Draft – 2 m
Speed – 3 kn
Endurance – 12+ months
Range – unlimited
??Source: Saildrone Inc.