Autonomous Underwater Inspection of Caving Systems

Abstract: This thesis aims to create and design a way for a unmanned underwater vehicle to navigateunderwater without the need for human interaction in order to carry out inspections of underwaterstructures or caving systems in a safe and effective manner. The inspection of underwater structuresor underwater caving systems is a difficult and expensive process. A control system script wascreated in the open-source framework Robotics Operating System, ROS so that the robot hasenough tools to be able to carry out such an inspection. These tools range from being able tofollow given trajectories, locate, create and move towards given waypoints and avoid obstaclesthat obstructs its path. Two different movement controls were created and utilised in differentparts of the inspection missions. The testing of the vehicle show that it can carry out a fullinspection mission while avoiding obstacles. The robot can with an updated sensor suite and morecomplex obstacle avoidance algorithms navigate in underwater environment.