Wikipedia

Ocean Infinity

Ocean Infinity is a marine robotics company based in Austin, Texas, United States and Southampton, United Kingdom and was founded in 2017. The company uses robots to obtain information from the ocean and seabed.[1][2]

Ocean Infinity
Company typePrivate
IndustryMarine Robotics
FoundedJuly 2017; 7 years ago (2017-07)
Headquarters
Austin, Texas
,
United States
Key people
  • Oliver Plunkett
    (CEO)
Websiteoceaninfinity.com

History

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Ocean Infinity is based in Austin, Texas and Southampton, England, and was founded in July 2017. The company is led by CEO Oliver Plunkett and is a privately held company.[1][3] Ocean Infinity was created after recognising the effectiveness of using marine robots in scale to acquire and analyse data from the oceans.[4]

Robots

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Ocean Infinity operates two robotic fleets; the Armada fleet and the Infinity fleet. The Infinity fleet is made up of fourteen autonomous underwater vehicles that are currently operating in oceans globally, and the Armada fleet will initially comprise fifteen robotic ships that will be operational by the end of 2020. The fleets are equipped with sensors and navigation technology and are capable of operating down to 6,000 meters depth.[5][6] The company reported in May 2022 that the first of 23 Armada surface vessels had recently been launched in Vietnam.[7]

Projects

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Summary

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Summary of successful search missions that Ocean Infinity was involved:

Ship/Submarine Date sunk Date discovered Depth Ref
ARA San Juan (S-42) November 15, 2017 November 17, 2018 920m [8]
Stellar Daisy March 31, 2017 February 17, 2019 3461m [9]
Minerve January 27, 1968 July 21, 2019 2350m [10][11]
USS Nevada (BB-36) July 31, 1948 May 11, 2020 4700m (15400 ft) [12]
Endurance November 21, 1915 March 5, 2022 3000m [13][14]
USS Stewart (DD-224) May 24, 1946 August 1, 2024 1060m (3500 ft) [15][16]

Details

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Ocean Infinity was involved in the search for Malaysia Airlines Flight 370 in early 2018, deploying Seabed Constructor between January and May without success.[17] In November of the same year, Seabed Constructor located the wreck of Argentine submarine ARA San Juan, which had disappeared a year earlier.[18] At the end of December 2018, Ocean Infinity was contracted by the South Korean government to search for the wreck of the sunken bulk carrier ship Stellar Daisy, which sank in March 2017 in the South Atlantic Ocean off the coast of Uruguay.[19] On 17 February 2019, the company announced that it believed it had found the ship's wreck,[20] and soon afterward retrieved the voyage data recorder.[21]

In addition to the high-profile wreck searches, Ocean Infinity has also undertaken data acquisition support for Total E&P, Shell Mauritania, Norwegian Petroleum Directorate, Exxon Mobil, NOAA and Petrobras.[22][23][24][25][26]

In early 2019, the wreck of Grande America was localized by Island Pride, which arrived 30 March and started inspecting the wreck using remotely operated underwater vehicles.[27] In July 2019, the company found the French Navy submarine Minerve, 50 years after its disappearance.[28] In 2020, Ocean Infinity also worked with Search INC to locate the battleship USS Nevada.[29][30]

Ocean Infinity has also provided technical expertise and equipment to locate Ernest Shackleton's ship Endurance, which sank 27 October 1915 after having been beset in ice of the Weddell Sea off Antarctica. The Falklands Maritime Heritage Trust's project Endurance22 was successful on 5 March 2022.[13][14]

In December 2024, it was reported that Ocean Infinity would resume the search for the missing Malaysia Airlines Flight MH370 under a $70 million 'no find, no fee' agreement with the Malaysian government. [31]

References

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  1. ^ a b Amos, Jonathan (February 10, 2020). "Ocean survey company goes for robot boats at scale". BBC News.
  2. ^ "Ocean Infinity's Innovative Marine Robotics Solutions for Sustainable Operations". portusonline.org.
  3. ^ "OCEAN INFINITY LIMITED - Overview (free company information from Companies House)". beta.companieshouse.gov.uk.
  4. ^ "Ocean Infinity". Ocean Infinity.
  5. ^ "Ocean Infinity unveils fleet of robot exploration vessels". Offshore Technology | Oil and Gas News and Market Analysis. February 5, 2020.
  6. ^ Maritime, Baird (February 10, 2020). "Ocean Infinity to launch 15-vessel AUV fleet under new company".
  7. ^ "Armada launches to sea". 2022-05-09. Retrieved 2023-07-07.
  8. ^ "Ocean Infinity Locates the Missing Argentinian Submarine, ARA San Juan". Ocean Infinity. 17 November 2018. Archived from the original on 18 November 2018. Retrieved 21 November 2018.
  9. ^ "Remembering the search for MV Stellar Daisy, four years on…". Ocean Infinity. 17 Feb 2023. Retrieved 2024-12-22.
  10. ^ Allen Kim (July 22, 2019). "50 years after disappearing off the coast of France, the submarine Minerve is found". CNN.
  11. ^ Guibert, Nathalie (22 July 2019). "La " Minerve ", le sous-marin disparu il y a cinquante ans, a été retrouvé au large de Toulon". Le Monde (in French). Retrieved 2019-07-22.
  12. ^ Werner, Ben (2020-05-11). "VIDEO: Research Groups Find Wreck of 'Unsinkable Battleship' USS Nevada". USNI News. Retrieved 2024-12-25.
  13. ^ a b Ocean Infinity (March 9, 2022). "Ocean Infinity on X: "We are extremely proud of our team involved in the discovery of Sir Ernest Shackleton's lost vessel ... / X".
  14. ^ a b Jonathan Amos (9 March 2022). "Endurance: Shackleton's lost ship is found in Antarctic". BBC.
  15. ^ Ocean Infinity; Air/Sea Heritage Foundation; SEARCH (October 1, 2024). "Ocean Explorers Discover the Wreck of USS Stewart, A World War II Warship Once Known as the "Ghost Ship of the Pacific"" (PDF). Retrieved 2024-12-22.
  16. ^ Michael Greshko (October 1, 2024). "Wreck of 'Ghost Ship of the Pacific' Found Off California". New York Times. Retrieved 2024-12-22.
  17. ^ "A Search for MH370, Missing Since 2014, Ends 'With a Heavy Heart'". The New York Times. 29 May 2018. Retrieved 18 November 2018.
  18. ^ "Argentine Submarine San Juan Is Found". The Wall Street Journal. 17 November 2018. Retrieved 18 November 2018.
  19. ^ "Ocean Infinity to Support South Korean Government in Search for Stellar Daisy". oceaninfinity.com. Archived from the original on 5 August 2019. Retrieved 23 July 2019.
  20. ^ David Aaro (17 February 2019). "South Korean tanker Stellar Daisy found on ocean floor 2 years after it sank, explorers say". Fox News.
  21. ^ Yonhap (18 February 2019). "Search ship retrieves voyage data recorder from sunken Stellar Daisy". The Korea Herald. Retrieved 23 July 2019.
  22. ^ "Ocean Infinity wraps up offshore Angola survey project". Offshore Technology | Oil and Gas News and Market Analysis. March 5, 2020.
  23. ^ Mishra, Baibhav (September 24, 2019). "Ocean Infinity completes data expedition for Norwegian Petroleum Directorate".
  24. ^ "NOAA teams with Ocean Infinity to advance new tools for ocean exploration and mapping | National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration". www.noaa.gov. 9 January 2020.
  25. ^ "Ocean Infinity to provide AUV surveys for Petrobras". January 16, 2019.
  26. ^ "ExxonMobil picks Ocean Infinity for AUV data acquisition offshore Guyana". Offshore Technology | Oil and Gas News and Market Analysis. March 2, 2020.
  27. ^ [1] [dead link‍]
  28. ^ Silvia Ayuso (22 July 2019). "Localizados los restos del 'Minerve', un submarino francés desaparecido en 1968". El País.
  29. ^ "Photos: Ocean Infinity Finds Famed Battleship USS Nevada". The Maritime Executive. Retrieved 2024-12-25.
  30. ^ "Undersea explorers find wreck of USS Nevada, the ship that almost escaped Pearl Harbor". washingtonpost.com. May 25, 2020.
  31. ^ "MH370: Malaysia agrees to resume search for missing passenger jet". BBC News. 2024-12-20. Retrieved 2024-12-20.
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