Self-Deploying, Depth-Adaptive Coastal Oceanographic Mooring

摘要

A compact, low-cost, self-deploying moored oceanographic sensor system has beendeveloped jointly by the Naval Research Laboratory and the Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution. Called XMOOR (for Expendable Oceanographic Mooring), the system is suitable for a variety of meteorological and oceanographic sensors, may be deployed (and if desired, retrieved) in a matter of minutes by untrained personnel, and automatically adapts the length of deployed line to the water depth, so depth need not be accurately known. A two-way radio link with the user allows both real-time reception of data and transmission of command and control messages to the unit. An ARGOS satellite link allows monitoring of instrument position and selected summary data on the Status of sensors and battery power. The system is suitable for both research and operational purposes. This report describes the design of the system and results of initial tests.