Image

Dressed for the Deep

September 29, 2016

WHOI engineer Molly Curran puts the finishing touches on the autonomous underwater vehicle (AUV) Sentry by re-attaching its freshly-cleaned, bright yellow “skins.” The vehicle was completing a maintenance period before heading out on a mission to explore coral communities in deep-sea canyons off the coast of North Carolina. Sentry produces magnetic and sonar maps, and digital photographs, of the ocean floor. Like its predecessor, the Autonomous Benthic Explorer (ABE), Sentry is designed to conduct high-resolution surveys in extreme seafloor terrain such as around underwater volcanoes and hydrothermal vents. (Photo by Ken Kostel, Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution)