ASA in the News

Marine Technology Reporter - October 2008

Naval Sub and Drift Software Aid North Sea Hunt for Bonhomme Richard

ASA's key role in the ongoing search for the famous Bonhomme Richard along with U.S. Naval submarine highlighted in the October issue of Marine Technology Reporter.

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As the search for the famous Bonhomme Richard Revolutionary War ship wreck continues, ASA's custom drift simulation software is credited for providing promising targets for the current phase of the search using a Nuclear Naval Submarine to survey identified sites on the ocean floor.

The Bonhomme Richard, captained by American naval hero John Paul Jones, sank in the North Sea in 1779, after claiming victory over the British ship HMS Serapis in one of the most pivotal battles of the Revolutionary War. An intense shipwreck search effort organized by the nonprofit Ocean Technology Foundation (OTF) in Groton, Connecticut, and the Naval Historical Center (NHC) in Washington, D.C. has been underway since 2006. As part of the high-tech approach used in the recent search efforts, OTF brought Applied Science Associates (ASA) and JMS Naval Architects & Salvage Engineers onto the project to help pinpoint the wreck site as well as now is getting help from another technological powerhouse: a nuclear submarine.

The NR-1, the U.S. Navy's only nuclear-powered research submarine, is in the North Sea using powerful sonar and underwater cameras to search for the famed Bonhomme Richard. The effort dramatizes how software — and now, nuclear technology — is aiding the search for sunken relics of world history.

Melissa Ryan, lead project manager for the Ocean Technology Foundation in Groton, Conn., said the Navy assigned the Navy's only nuclear-powered research submarine, manned by a crew of 11 submariners, to the expedition. OTF has spent the last three summers hunting for the remains of the Bonhomme Richard.

The expedition has identified several wrecks that might be Jones' ship since the hunt began in 2006. But the team has been unable to positively identify its target. "Sometimes there's no replacement for a pair of human eyes," Chris Cooper, another project scientist with the OTF said.

"Navy experts will be able to visually inspect spots on the sea floor where ship timbers and other features have been located by sonar signals," he says.

This assignment will likely be the last for the NR-1 sub, as the U.S. Navy announced it is on the brink of retirement. The Navy holds special interest in the project. A heavy underdog, and outgunned in the vicious battle, uttering the famous quote, "I have not yet begun to fight," despite dire circumstances, John Paul Jones is credited as the founding father of the U.S. Navy.

Submerged in the North Sea

Jones' missing ship and the NR-1 are separated by more than 200 years of history and couldn't be more different, says Joseph Callo, the author of a prize-winning biography of John Paul Jones.

"(But) there's an instructive match between today's U.S. Navy sailors and those who fought a horrific battle and won with John Paul Jones on Bonhomme Richard," Callo said. The NR-1, which is capable of diving thousands of feet, will be operating at relatively shallow depths of about 175 feet. The North Sea is known for its strong currents and poor underwater visibility.

The sub's nuclear reactor lets it submerge for long periods and cover large swathes of ocean bottom. "She can stay down and operate 24/7," Cooper said.

The sub is equipped with thick glass view-ports and banks of underwater lights that can illuminate submerged objects. It also carries 16 different TV cameras that operate in low light, as well as advanced electronics and computers that aid in locating objects. Besides the use of the NR-1, the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration also donated a large research ship and crew last year to help in the search. Cooper says the NR-1 arrived aboard a support ship at a site off Flamborough Head, Britain, in June 2008 and has been searching various sites during the summer. Researchers say they're close to figuring out where the ship lies by sifting through sonar data and zeroing in on the probable wreck site through process of elimination and an already focused area due to the help of another key hi-tech tool.

The High-Tech Advantage: Drift Simulation Software

The Bonhomme Richard search is drawing scientific interest because it's using cutting-edge software that creates what's called a drift simulation model. The model incorporates tidal, wind and historical data from the day the battle was fought to find where the ship lies.

Rick Fernandes, a naval graphics expert, says it's the first time this type of software has been used to search for the wreck of an 18th-century ship.

"What we needed to do existed in two separate software programs, so ASA built us a hybrid application — combining their oil spill prediction software and their Coast Guard search and rescue software," says Rick Fernandes, a naval graphics expert at JMS aiding in the project. "The software uses physical laws, as well as tidal and wind data from the period, times and locations given by eyewitnesses," to plot the most probable resting place of the vessel. Eric Comerma, a Ph.D. senior researcher at ASA, led the complex challenge of data integration into a geographical information systems (GIS) framework and he insists that "collaborating with this dedicated team in the search for the Bonhomme Richard is such fulfilling work because it is both challenging as well as historically significant."

Assisting ASA's Eric Comerma, was U.S. Coast Guard Special Operations Search & Rescue expert, Art Allen, 26 MTR October 2008 who played a key role in the development of the object drift modeling methodology that was integrated into the modeling. This was data integration never before brought in to models of this purpose and was used to more accurately represent the effects of the wind and current on the slowly sinking vessel. Due to the complexity of the battle circumstances, which consisted of a large ship taking on water and damage, sails burning, yet becoming fully disabled while trying to sail over a period of 36 hours, new and additional factors were integrated by the team. With key knowledge and experience from Art Allen, one of the world's leading experts on disabled vessels at sea, this modeling software is first of its kind.

The software was developed by Applied Science Associates of Narragansett, R.I., an environmental and technology consulting firm that makes software for marine and underwater uses.

"We're figuring out the location of a ship that was half afloat, with sails burning, while taking into account tides and currents," Lee Dooley ASA's Marketing & Communications Director said of the Bonhomme Richard search custom software development.

A lot of the "heavy lifting" by the software was done on earlier expeditions, he added. "This is why they're using a submarine this time around to inspect the actual sites they've identified using our drift software."

The OTF and NHC have a Web site, bonhommerichard.org that provides more details on the ongoing search effort.