Is anyone crossing the Atlantic heading west? Can anyone rescue ADA

[thruska]

Originally Posted by coastalexplorer

I Have been informed that radio contact with the sailbot Ada has been lost. With out steerage to point into the 35 foot waves the storm damage appears to have silenced its transmissions. So It is not known If it has sunk. It did have 17 watertight compartments. However the weather reports for the north Atlantic continue to worsen.

In conclusion I have been most surprised by some of the harsh comments and negative postings about this sailing experiment. I always thought that the information gained potentially could provide useful upgrades to current Autopilot technology? Perhaps IF this were available? Some of the most ardent dissenters would be only too happy to use it?


I suggest the time has come for the moderators to close this thread.

I would think that you look back on the thread and digest it a bit more. Treat it as a required reading lesson in your term of study.
Do not treat it as all negative and pull the plug. Why would you wash your hands of it now? Do you abandon your own project? If it was cash out of your own pocket would you treat it differently?
You have a mixed review here on CF. Take the heat and forge on . It goes with the territory. Did you reach out to previous sponsors? Did they offer up any help? I hope they were kept abreast of their investment.
Wanting to close the thread because you don't like the negative side of your endeavor is not responsible imho.

Where you able to retrieve any info? In it all lost ? Perhaps you can build on what you have learned.

[JerseyJoe]

Originally Posted by MarkJ

Quick! Check the Amendments to your Consitution! How DARE they break Amendment 116 "Right to Freely Have Every Wave to Myself".
Of course, its OK to have autonomous taxis in Washington DC from next July, but on our OCEAN??

And look where this 10 foot bit of plank is: Right in the MIDDLE of where so many sailors go! Directly between Newfoundland and whats that Leprechaun country called? Its a highway of cruising boats out there, a motorway, a turnpike, and autobahn... Even Boatman61 has cruised accross there back in 1850.


Signed,

DISGUSTED!

To Boatman61's credit, I believe it was 1848. Leap year, ya know!

[Sofie B]

Originally Posted by thruska

I would think that you look back on the thread and digest it a bit more. Treat it as a required reading lesson in your term of study.
Do not treat it as all negative and pull the plug. Why would you wash your hands of it now? Do you abandon your own project? If it was cash out of your own pocket would you treat it differently?
You have a mixed review here on CF. Take the heat and forge on . It goes with the territory. Did you reach out to previous sponsors? Did they offer up any help? I hope they were kept abreast of their investment.
Wanting to close the thread because you don't like the negative side of your endeavor is not responsible imho.

Where you able to retrieve any info? In it all lost ? Perhaps you can build on what you have learned.

Whilst I am a believer of not sweating the small sh*t, I thought coastalexplorer was just trying to help others. It's not his project. I suspect it's because of the turn of the thread, that he suggested to close but as you say, much can be learnt from the whole experience. Sometimes (as I'd say was this case) asking for help and then it leading off on a tangent can be quite useful, other times ,not so much. It could be of benefit if people who think it irresponsible tried to express their concern to the group (albeit without vitriol perhaps) . That said I wish them well and hope for some break through for their efforts

[Dody]

Originally Posted by coastalexplorer

... Actually I asked David to mount all this technology on my yacht because it would allow me to sleep at night. but he said it has to be tested & proved first. because of the liability IF it did not work. The other side to this is that IF there was a human on board there might have been a chance to repair the steering mechanism.

Originally Posted by coastalexplorer

I Have been informed that radio contact with the sailbot Ada has been lost. With out steerage to point into the 35 foot waves the storm damage appears to have silenced its transmissions. So It is not known If it has sunk. It did have 17 watertight compartments. However the weather reports for the north Atlantic continue to worsen.

In conclusion I have been most surprised by some of the harsh comments and negative postings about this sailing experiment. I always thought that the information gained potentially could provide useful upgrades to current Autopilot technology? Perhaps IF this were available? Some of the most ardent dissenters would be only too happy to use it? ...

Honestly, since when do we try to test new equipment on a sailing-boat without someone on board? There was absolutely no need for that! I'm very sure and convinced that, asked via a forum for example, hundreds of sailing-boats could have been found to test the equipment when installed on their boats in all parts of the world. There would have been no danger involved as the person/persons on board would have been there to interfere if something goes wrong and set things right again. No risk of loosing the equipment, no costs involved and no risk of possibly endangering others. Sailing and the oceans are relatively well known environments compared to the first trys to send a monkey in the orbit, and in relatively well known environments you test things with a pair of hands next to it to interfere if there is a problem.

Too late now, but did they have more means to avoid collisions than AIS? The majority of us out there don't have AIS!

Fair winds
Dody

[Bulawayo]

Good and valid point.

Originally Posted by GreenIssue

Sheesh, It's amazing how many A-holes pop up with their opinions on this site. It's gotten so that you can hardly use the site as it was intended any longer. The post is someone asking for a hand with towing the craft back, not your stupid paranoid self important opinions.

Silence is better than bull$#!t

[Dody]

Originally Posted by h20man

Please try to understand AIS. It broadcasts on VHF. Both Class A and Class B.

The GPS is a SATELLITE RECEIVER (only) that lets the AIS system know where it is. It has NOTHING to do with TRANSMITTING a signal. The GPS (from multiple satellites ) is broadcast on VHF to let others know your position and speed, and heading. (speed and heading calculated over time and previous GPS position.)

There are satellites in space that receive VHF (and AIS signals) and pass them to the ground.

Just had to chime in here...

Thanks to you all and sorry again about starting this in the wrong thread. It was unknown to me that there do exist satellites in space which are able to receive a VHF (and AIS) signal. As far as my knowledge went was, that often cargo-ships have the means to communicate by satellite to send their own GPS position to the AIS system when out of reach of landbased stations.

Fair winds
Dody

[Dody]

I was just reading a bit on their website (http://www,ubcsailbot.org/) and found out that they are doing this every year, but this year raising their goal in the attempt to cross the Atlantic ocean. It doen's say yet what their plans are for next year.

They might or might not have lost their boat, but it would be nice if someone could inform the UBC Sailboat people about our concerns regarding the subject!

Fair winds
Dody

[SVNeko]

I read it that their AIS was receive only.

Sent from my MotoG3 using Cruisers Sailing Forum mobile app

[Davidhoy]

Originally Posted by SVNeko

I read it that their AIS was receive only.

That would seem rather pointless. Receive-only AIS doesn't do too much good unless you have someone onboard to monitor it. A class B AIS beacon would make much more sense. Not only would that provide other vessels the ability to know that Ada was nearby, but with the AIS-S satellites receiving the VHF signal and relaying the data to a ground station, they would also be able to track Ada's position and progress.

[30yearslater]

I wouldn't get down in the dumps Coastalexplorer. Learn what you can and move on. I am not personally in favor of autonomous anything since mixing it with the human element is likely to be an area of great confusion and presents the probability of the unfortunate. I am; however, in favor of technology able to enhance the human condition. Ships and boats with advanced collision avoidance systems beyond RADAR, AIS and GPS do offer promise as a backup to human error. I don't think anyone laments the demise of the Sextant. Fog is no longer the killer it once was. Dead reckoning is virtually dead and all this is the result of technology. Learn from the criticisms and concerns and then apply that in a mature way to further technology. Good luck with future projects.

[coastalexplorer]

Clarification....As I stated here in my previous post this was NOT MY Project. They had a display at the 2014 Vancouver international boat show. where incidentally there was nary a sail in sight. So being disappointed in that I headed right over too them.

By trade I am a British trained Engineers Patternmaker (semi retired) So with my contacts in Foundry work the conversation quickly turned to discussion about the possibility of Casting the rather strange an radical designed deep fin keel that had a huge amount of rake to it so as to avoid fouling in fishing nets. In the end I did not make this: Thus I do not know as the end result IF it was cast or fabricated. 75 Kg.

The principles of educational endeavour involves aspects of challenging problem solving. and the key word here concerning the objective was 'Autonomous' by using a simple sailing vessel there was to be no maintenance of diesel engines, changing of filters, and repairing of fuel lines. not even an electric motor driving a propellor. hence IF it was a case of testing with human intervention available the result would not be 'Autonomous' the moment that the human intervened.

Another aspect raised in the casual hypothetical discussion I had was this: The point was raised: IF a human was on board? and after trusting the system based on some previous considerable success early in the voyage.?(as incidentally was the case with the recent experiment ) That the human should trust it enough to go to sleep. Should something go wrong it could cause injury or death resulting in liability. NOTE casual hypothetical conversation only! scuttlebutt! back to the key word 'Autonomous'

So YES the point is/was I support education, I remained interested in their project. I wished them well and total success. So when things started to go wrong I thought it reasonable to ask you lot to try to help them recover Ada for a second attempt.
The possibilities for this technology is only my assumption as to what use it could be put to. I doubt they were looking that far ahead.

I have stated before that IMHO when threads get so far off topic & even into slagging matches they should be closed. I am aware that some of you do not agree with me on this. How ever at this point I am done with it. IF Ada washes up on the west coast of europe send me an IM Please.

[exitstrategy]

I am also surprised by the negative comments.

The is a small craft with AIS and collision avoidance systems. Those three *alone* make this a far safer vehicle on the ocean than *all* of the solo sailors, especially the ones who refuse to keep up with AIS and other safety equipment.

Even couples sailing are essentially solo sailors taking turns and they are not watching the horizon 24x7. So, please.

Also the point of solo sailors dying is spot-on. Doesn't matter if your death is an accident vs a university experiment. You have your 30-ton floating boat adrift without any active collision avoidance systems. It is the solo and couple sailors that are many orders of magnitude more dangerous than this craft.

Then you have shipping containers, and logs, and concrete structures and *millions* of other bits floating around.

Then there are military craft that like to come out of the night without their lights on to test themselves on *you*. Etc, etc. etc.

A piece of science trying to make navigation *safe* should be earning applause and not scorn.

The real issue behind the negative comments, I believe is fear of technological change. And that fear is valid because the change from technology is unpredictable in who benefits and who loses. But at least be honest and just say tech is scary.

[savoir]

Tech is scary? Not at all, well not for me anyway. What is scary is sailing into an out of control unmanned vessel.

[jackdale]

Originally Posted by savoir

Tech is scary? Not at all, well not for me anyway. What is scary is sailing into an out of control unmanned vessel.

There 3,739 Argo buoys that pop to the surface at regular intervals.



There are also uncharted free floating weather buoys; I saw one coming back from Maui last month.

[jwcolby54]

Originally Posted by jackdale

There 3,739 Argo buoys that pop to the surface at regular intervals.



There are also uncharted free floating weather buoys; I saw one coming back from Maui last month.

Please don't confuse the issue. They really don't want to hear it. This one little thing is infinitely more dangerous than all the other millions of much larger unmanned things floating around out there.

Just let them have their rant.