ALERT21 Underwater Glider Design and Prototyping of the ALERT21 Underwater Glider

The ALERT21 Underwater Glider is an Unmanned Underwater Vehicle (UUV) built for a plethora of ocean exploration and monitoring applications. The ALERT21 is designed for high endurance and low power consumption to maximize mission duration.

A buoyancy engine enables power efficient operation, which uses power only at the summit and valley of each glide cycle. Additionally, articulating wings allow ALERT21 to achieve very shallow glide angles. This reduces the glider’s friction through the water, which greatly improves the glider’s ability to traverse long distances without consuming much power.

Undersea autonomous gliders are used for a plethora of applications. One of the most common uses is for weather monitoring. The ALERT21 can report back specific conditions that allow people to make more accurate and earlier weather forecasts. This helps with early hurricane detection which provides more time to prepare.

The ALERT21 can also be used for data collection for the research in ocean trends. Due to the long mission time, data points can be collected over a very long duration allowing for sufficient sampling of data to better understand the oceans of the world.