Operational Aspects of Swimming and Seabed Crawling ROVs for Search and Salvage of Lost Dangerous Cargoes

Abstract

Dangerous cargoes lost in the North Sea must be salvaged before they can cause accidents. Lost cargoes must be found using sonar, and then identified with still and video cameras mounted on a remotely operated vehicle (ROV). Finally, the cargoes must be salvaged or neutralized. The practice of search, location, selection, identification and salvage of cargoes and dangerous goods lost in the Dutch sector of the North Sea is presented in this chapter. Special attention is paid to technical and operational aspects of locating and identifying lost cargoes. The applicability of a diver, a swimming ROV or a seabed crawling ROV for these operations is examined. Two recent cases are elaborated.