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USV Survey Companies
Exail
Cutting-Edge Acoustic Positioning & Subsea Imagery Solutions for Unmanned & Robotic Systems
Platinum Partner
SatLab Geosolutions
GNSS Positioning Systems, 3D SLAM & Mobile Mapping, Unmanned Surface Vehicles
Gold Partner
The Complete Guide to USV Survey Services
Introduction to USV Survey Services
USV survey services use Unmanned Surface Vessels (USVs) to collect hydrographic, bathymetric, geophysical, environmental, and visual data across marine and inland-water environments. Equipped with survey sensors, positioning and motion-reference systems, autonomous navigation, and remote communications, these vessels can carry out repeatable, georeferenced data collection without a crew onboard.
USV survey operations are used for seabed mapping, offshore infrastructure assessment, coastal surveys, oceanographic research, search and detection, and other marine survey tasks. Depending on mission requirements, a survey USV may operate autonomously along pre-planned routes, under remote supervision, or as part of a coordinated mission involving crewed vessels, Autonomous Underwater Vehicles (AUVs), or Remotely Operated Vehicles (ROVs).
Key Types of USV Survey Services
Hydrographic Survey
Hydrographic survey USVs collect measurements relating to water depth, seabed form, navigation hazards, and other features required for charting, marine engineering, dredging, coastal management, and port operations. By following tightly controlled survey lines while carrying acoustic sensors, positioning equipment, and motion-reference systems, USVs can collect data that is accurately corrected and georeferenced for subsequent processing.
Bathymetric Survey
Bathymetric survey USVs measure the depth and shape of the seabed using single-beam or multibeam echosounders, producing data that can be used to generate detailed representations of underwater terrain. These systems support surveys in coastal waters, rivers, reservoirs, harbors, and offshore areas, including locations that may be difficult or inefficient to access using larger crewed vessels.
Geophysical Survey
Geophysical survey USVs use sensors such as side-scan sonar, sub-bottom profilers, and marine magnetometers to investigate seabed characteristics and shallow subsurface conditions. The resulting data can support site characterization, route assessment, offshore development, unexploded ordnance detection, and geohazard investigation across a range of marine environments.
Seabed Mapping
USV seabed mapping combines acoustic sensing with positioning and motion data to produce georeferenced representations of seafloor topography and surface characteristics. Surveying USVs can also repeat predefined routes or areas, allowing changes in seabed morphology, sediment distribution, or infrastructure condition to be identified over time.
Environmental and Oceanographic Survey
Oceanographic survey USVs can carry water-quality instruments, current profilers, meteorological sensors, and other scientific payloads to collect data across coastal and offshore environments. These systems can measure currents, waves, temperature, salinity, dissolved oxygen, turbidity, and other physical or environmental parameters while following repeatable autonomous survey patterns.
Infrastructure and Asset Survey
USV survey services can support inspection and mapping around offshore platforms, wind farms, bridges, ports, pipelines, subsea cables, and other marine infrastructure. Surface-based sensors provide broad-area coverage and situational data, while USVs can also operate alongside submerged platforms where closer inspection or underwater intervention is required.
Search and Detection Survey
Search and detection missions use sonar, magnetometers, cameras, and other sensors to locate wrecks, debris, obstructions, lost equipment, unexploded ordnance, and other underwater or surface objects. Autonomous route following allows systematic coverage of defined search areas, helping ensure that survey lines and sensor coverage remain consistent across the mission.
Sensors & Payloads Used for USV Surveys
The payload fitted to a USV depends on the required measurements, survey environment, platform capacity, and desired data resolution. Survey measurements are typically combined with positioning, heading, timing, and vessel-motion information so that the resulting data can be accurately located, corrected, and integrated during processing.
- Echosounders and Sonar Systems: Multibeam echosounders measure depth across a wide swath for detailed bathymetric mapping and seabed characterization, while single-beam echosounders provide targeted depth measurements directly beneath the USV. Side-scan sonar produces acoustic imagery for detecting seabed features, debris, objects, and changes in surface texture.
- Sub-Bottom Profilers and Marine Magnetometers: Sub-bottom profilers investigate sediment layers, buried objects, and shallow geological structures beneath the seabed, while marine magnetometers detect magnetic anomalies associated with ferrous objects, buried infrastructure, wreckage, or unexploded ordnance.
- Oceanographic and Environmental Sensors: Acoustic Doppler Current Profilers (ADCPs) measure current velocity and direction through the water column, while environmental and water quality sensors can measure temperature, salinity, dissolved oxygen, turbidity, chlorophyll, and other parameters used in oceanographic and environmental surveys.
- Positioning and Motion Reference Systems: Global Navigation Satellite System (GNSS) receivers and Inertial Navigation Systems (INS) provide position, heading, attitude, and motion data used to georeference survey measurements and compensate for vessel movement.
- Optical and Laser Imaging Systems: Light Detection and Ranging (LiDAR), laser scanners, cameras, and other optical imaging systems support the measurement and inspection of shorelines, exposed structures, bridges, harbor infrastructure, visible marine assets, and other above-water or near-surface features.
Multiple payloads may be operated together when a mission requires synchronized acoustic, positioning, environmental, and visual datasets, allowing several complementary measurements to be collected during the same survey run.
Emerging Developments in USV Survey Services
USV survey technology continues to develop as autonomy, communications, onboard processing, and sensor integration improve, allowing increasingly complex survey tasks to be conducted with less continuous human intervention.
- Greater autonomy: Increased onboard decision-making supports route following, obstacle avoidance, adaptive mission planning, and automated responses to changing survey conditions.
- USV and AUV collaboration: Surface vessels can support AUV operations through positioning updates, communications relay, mission coordination, data transfer, and deployment support, allowing surface and subsurface systems to work as part of the same survey mission.
- Onboard data processing: Edge computing enables preliminary quality control, object detection, data filtering, and mission adjustment while a survey is still underway, reducing the need to wait until recovery or mission completion before assessing collected data.
- Remote operations: Improved communications and fleet-management systems support longer-duration missions and centralized supervision of USVs operating across multiple survey areas.
Together, these developments are expanding the role of USV survey services across hydrographic, bathymetric, geophysical, environmental, and oceanographic survey operations.
