Diver-based Control of a Tethered Unmanned Underwater Vehicle

Human-robot communication with an underwater vehicle is a complex problem. Standard wireless communication protocols are unavailable, and the lack of direct supervision from surface-based operators reduces situational awareness and operational efficiencies. Here we describe recent research results with tethered operation of autonomous vehicles at depth by diving operators. We review different operational designs and describe a novel system based on exploiting advances in lightweight computational platforms (tablet devices) as the basis of the operator control console. Recent field experiments are also described.