Designing, Building, and Managing an Autonomous Boat and its Transatlantic Crossing Attempt

Rodriguez, Dylan Tabare

Student Work

Designing, Building, and Managing an Autonomous Boat and its Transatlantic Crossing Attempt Public

Scout was a 13 foot long boat designed by myself and several of my friends to navigate without a crew on a 3,500 mile journey from Rhode Island to Spain using only solar power and onboard processors to complete the crossing. The project received significant media attention and was closely followed by tens of thousands of curious onlookers. Although Scout was built by a group of young college students solely for fun, execution of the project led us to begin investigation of ways that autonomous boats could be used in marine research applications. The purpose of this project is to study the entirety of the Scout project, examine potential uses of products similar to Scout, and present recommendations for future autonomous surface vessel development.

Creator