Modular Amphibious Research Crawler

A crawling Remotely Operated Vehicle (ROV) has been developed for scientific activities within coastal and estuarine regions of the ocean for multiple research activities such as environmental impact assessment and integrated coastal zone management. The Modular Amphibious Research Crawler (MARC-1) ROV is designed to operate underwater and in the surfzone to a depth of five meters. The vehicle is controlled by a remote control cable from the beach or boat up to distances of 165 meters and is equipped with a video camera and acoustic and environmental data gathering instruments to improve and automate the inspection and sampling of the coastal marine environment. The vehicle is specifically designed for beach profile surveying and scientific data collection. To test the vehicle, various scientific surveys typically desired by the coastal environmentalist or scientist will be conducted, such as the assessment of the biodiversity of organisms that live in the region from two meters to five meters in depth.