Offshore staff
YATELEY, UK – Fugro has chosen underwater positioning technology from Sonardyne Inc. for its upcoming offshore wind farm projects in North America.
The company has ordered three Sonardyne Mini-Ranger 2 ultra-short baseline (USBL) underwater positioning systems to support shallow-water site characterization surveys, and a standard Ranger 2 for positioning geotechnical boreholes that will influence turbine foundation design and installation.
In addition, Fugro has also ordered wideband sub-mini 6+ and nano transponders to fit to the underwater equipment it will be tracking with is new USBLs, including side-scan sonars and transverse gradiometer systems.
Mini-Ranger 2 can simultaneously track 10 targets at fast update rates, is quick to install, and has an operating range of up to 4,000 m (13,123 ft). For this application, the Mini-Ranger 2 HPT 3000 transceivers will be mounted over-the-side of Fugro’s vessels to provide very shallow, high-elevation tracking, without losing positioning accuracy.
Ranger 2 is capable of simultaneous long range target tracking, dynamic positioning, and subsea communications. It is being supplied to Fugro with an HPT 7000 Gyro USBL, which combines the vessel heading, pitch and roll data that is critical to USBL system precision, with an acoustic transceiver – in a single housing.
Using Gyro USBL means that owners can move their Ranger 2 between vessels of opportunity and avoid the need to undertake post-installation performance tests before subsea operations can begin, saving expensive vessel time, the company said.
07/14/2020
