Underwater Archaeology with Light AUVs

For millennia, ships were lost at sea leading to the loss of an estimated 3 million vessels. This paper describes a light autonomous underwater vehicle specially tailored for coastal archaeology applications where a big part of this heritage sites should be found. This specific vehicle includes sonars, an optical camera and a magnetometer to detect and identify archaeological artifacts in the ocean bottom or underneath. It can be used isolated or as part of a team of AUVs for faster surveys. We describe the hardware, its simplified operation using custom-made software and overview some results in different areas, where these vehicles have been used to detect several wrecks and other important artifacts.