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The "Mayflower 400", the first "intelligent" boat, prepares to cross the Atlantic

2021-05-05T02:58:32.474Z


It is preparing, around May 15 if the weather permits, to attack the Atlantic Ocean. The "Mayflower 400" is however a well started ship.


She sails in Plymouth Bay, in the south-west of England.

But the "Mayflower 400" is not a boat like the others.

It cuts its engines or activates a hydrophone, designed to listen to whales.

All without any human intervention.

Capable of making its own decisions and sailing in total autonomy, this small trimaran 15 meters long and 9 tonnes, covered with solar panels, is preparing to cross the Atlantic Ocean on its own. Normally around May 15th depending on the weather and the authorization for the moment still uncertain from the British authorities. On his way to the United States, he will be able to study the environment by analyzing the presence of plastic in the water or in marine mammals.

The ocean "is the most powerful force on the planet which regulates our climate", explains Brett Phaneuf, founder of the ProMare association and architect of the project.

But more than 80% of the oceans remain unexplored, because of their vastness and the dangers involved.

“The sea is a harsh environment, so having a boat with no one on board really allows scientists to expand the study area,” said Rosie Lickorish, emerging technologies specialist at IBM, one of the partners who have joined the project since its birth four years ago.

3 weeks to reach Massachusetts

When the idea emerged, “other technology providers started to help us,” says Brett Phaneuf, as well as several “hundreds” of people from India to the United States, via Japan and Switzerland. .

Without this "global effort", the project "would have cost tens of millions" of dollars instead of "a little less than a million dollars" ultimately invested by ProMare, which will make the information collected free of charge.

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The first "smart" boat must take about three weeks to reach another Plymouth, Massachusetts, replicating the original "Mayflower" crossing over 400 years ago, in 1620, when around 100 "pilgrims" English religious dissidents, had left for the New World.

But for this trip to the 21st century, delayed by the pandemic, "no one will get sick"!

The construction of the fully robotic trimaran, from the rudder to the diesel generator set which supplements solar energy, took a year.

The development of its "virtual captain", an artificial intelligence who began by learning to identify maritime obstacles by analyzing thousands of photographs, took even longer.

The programmers also taught the "Mayflower 400" to avoid collisions.

"Thinking" alone

Armed with this knowledge, the boat went to sea for “supervised learning”.

“You can tell him what his good deeds are and what his bad deeds are, what is dangerous and what is not,” says Robotics Engineer Ollie Thompson.

Then “we go to the stage where the boat is capable of correcting itself”, that is to say of “thinking” thanks to a computer system which simulates the way in which a human brain analyzes information.

However, due to unheard-of regulations on navigation without anyone on board, the incredible ship has not yet been able to "go out on rough seas, with big waves, wind, rain".

But he trained to face 50-meter hollows using a… simulator!

Detecting animals, recognizing them, learning about the distribution of their populations, analyzing the chemical composition of water, measuring sea level and taking samples for microplastics are among its missions, a similar data collection to what robots have been doing in space for decades.

Despite its full autonomy, a team will monitor the boat 24 hours a day from England.

Ready to intervene remotely in case of danger.

Source: leparis

All life articles on 2021-05-05

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