Application of Passive Underwater Landmarks for Autonomous Unmanned Underwater Vehicles Navigation

Abstract

The article describes the design of passive underwater landmarks (PUL) and their use for navigation of autonomous unmanned underwater vehicles (AUV). The procedure of AUV observation using PUL is considered. It is shown that with proper maneuvering of the AUV during observation, the accuracy of determining its coordinates is limited only by the accuracy of the PUL positioning during installation. This accuracy also affects the distance between neighboring PULs installed along the AUV’s route. If the AUV is equipped with a high-precision autonomous navigation system, the PULs can be installed at the intervals of several hundred kilometers.