“Ghost Hunter™” Project Begins
AMV is announcing the start of its next major initiative to deploy autonomous technology in the marine environment. Dubbed “Ghost Hunter™”, AMV will be deploying its 3-meter Autonomous Coastal Monitor™, or ACM™, to conduct unmanned surveys of areas of the Chesapeake Bay to identify the location of derelict crab traps in support of recovery efforts. The project is being delivered under a NOAA Small Business Innovation Research (SBIR) contract designed to develop and commercialize innovative technologies.
Such derelict crab traps, referred to as “ghost pots”, are a widespread ecological problem affecting coastal communities throughout the U.S. Ghost pots are self-baiting—after initially being baited, crabs will enter the trap and eventually die. New crabs and other marine wildlife are then attracted to, enter, and die in the trap, repeating the cycle. A 2016 study sponsored by NOAA and the Virginia Institute of Marine Science estimated that 12-20% of the hundreds of thousands of pots deployed in the Chesapeake Bay annually are lost.
In addition to its ecological effects, ghost pots present an ongoing economic problem. The same study estimated that approximately 5% of the annual crab harvest is lost to ghost pots—an annual loss valued in the millions of dollars in the Chesapeake alone.
Nearly all states with pot fishing activity have programs oriented towards ghost pot removal, but these resources are limited. Current identification and recovery efforts are manpower intensive, using boat crews to survey an area and manually monitor sonar data looking for ghost pots, before physically removing them. AMV’s Ghost Hunter™ efforts are focused on improving recovery efforts by using unmanned and automated systems to reduce the cost of ghost pot identification, so that valuable and limited manned resources can focus on ghost pot recovery.
AMV’s ACM™ craft will autonomously survey areas known to be ghost pot “hot spots” using commercial sonar technology. The sonar data collected will be processed using advanced artificial intelligence/machine learning (AI/ML) technology to automate the identification of likely ghost pot locations. AMV will then generate map data that can be provided to recovery crews to guide their efforts.
Given the value of crab and lobster harvests, and the stunning losses incurred by the ghost pot problem, AMV envisions a future fleet of autonomous Ghost Hunter™ vessels being deployed around the country to support recovery efforts. Future developments involve bringing the data processing to the computing edge onboard the craft to enable live partnering between Ghost Hunter™ craft and manned recovery crews, and deploying technologies that will enable fully autonomous recovery operations.
To learn more about this technology being pioneered by AMV, or to discuss opportunities to utilize the Ghost Hunter™ technology in your project or region, please contact us at info@tridentis.com.
