Irrespective of how many times you visit the ocean side and the beach, you never get bored of it as each time it offers sights and sounds that are unique, glorious and shades that are different from the ones before. There is something about the deep blue oceans that has captivating charm which lures man to try and understand it and even conquer it if he chooses to do so. It is this quest to understand what actually lurks deep below that has resulted in this brand new high-tech gadget that explores ocean’s dark depths.
Far out in the Atlantic, a little yellow submarine is trying to slip from current to current, gliding across the ocean beneath the waves. The unmanned sub is nearing the halfway mark in its effort to travel from New Jersey to Spain, collecting scientific data along the way. As a part of observatory project by Rutgers University, the unmanned sub named ‘Scarlet Knight’ rides the ocean currents to explore its unknown regions.
Like a glider airplane, the sub doesn’t have a motor to drive it. Dubbed “Scarlet Knight” after the school mascot - never mind its color - the sub uses wings to fly through the water as it dives and rises, seeking currents that will carry it where the researchers want it to go, explained Scott Glenn, a marine sciences professor at Rutgers. It uses the currents of the ocean instead of fuel or air to navigate and right now it is riding on the Gulf Stream current. The Sub has to reach Spain across the Atlantic and it does so as a glider uses air currents. The undersea glider sucks water in to dive and then pushes it out again to rise, spending most of its time between 15 feet and 300 feet deep. The places where it re-emerges on top are calculated by the observers with the data in hand.
If this actually works and can get to production stage then it would mean a huge improvement in under-water research ability and will also make it all a lot less risky for us. In fact, it makes the entire process a lot simpler and when one can view ocean’s deepest and darkest corners to unravel the mysteries it has been keeping to itself for the past 5 million years from the comfort of a lab then it just is nothing short of extraordinary!
