For the CATALYST 2 expedition, the Waitt Institute based operations out of the port of Pago Pago in American Samoa. The deep, naturally sheltered harbor of Pago Pago was the closest port to the search site that offered the amenities and facilities that were needed to start our journey. While preparing for the expedition, the CATALYST team enjoyed a traditional Umu feast put on by the Pago Pago Yacht Club. The Umu usually consists of local foods like breadfruit and kalua-style pork cooked in an earthen oven. The CAT 2 team had a great time and it was a much-appreciated homemade meal before we set out to sea.

Before putting out to sea, the vehicle engineers from Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution decided to run some last-minute diagnostic tests on the AUVs, so they prepped the vehicle nick-named Mary Ann, checked her components and installed the electronic still camera. When she was ready to go, they rolled her out onto the Launch and Recovery System (LARS), and lowered her into Pago Pago harbor. The team ran Mary Ann continuously while they monitored her systems and tweaked her for maximum performance. Twelve hours later, the AUVs got the thumbs up from our engineers, and we were ready to set sail.

On the morning of February 10th, 2009, we officially began the search for Amelia. Up on the bridge, Captain George followed the guidance of the Harbor Pilot to clear us out of port, while out on deck, the expedition team watched the shores of American Samoa disappear, knowing that we may not set foot on land again for 7 more weeks. From here, our 4-day transit would take us 1000 miles northward into one of the most remote regions on earth. Medical assistance and rescue would be days away, and anything but the most severe injury would have to be taken care of at sea. Everyone on board was anxious to get to work, and also hoping for a quick discovery, so we could head back to the safety of shore before dwindling fuel and food would force our return some 45 days later.

This is the Research Vessel Seward Johnson – our home-away-from-home for two consecutive 45-day stretches at sea. At a little over 200 feet long, she was just the right size for our 30-person expedition team. The forward dry lab was set aside for the AUV team. The aft wet lab was set up for the marine biologists who would be organizing catches from their net trawls. And the third, and largest, lab was set aside for sonar analysis and became the nerve center of our expedition. This is where we had team meetings, discussed the search plan, and spent countless hours hunting through data for the lost Electra. The entire aft deck was customized to support our two underwater search vehicles and their continuous 24/7 operations. On the bridge and in command, Captain George Gunther kept the ship running smoothly, making sure we were where we needed to be, when we needed to be there. Overall, the Seward Johnson was a good ride and a great platform from which to work.

The Waitt Institute took a new approach to the search for Amelia by working with aviation investigators who reconstructed her last flight as they would a modern aviation accident. As part of their research, they inspected a vintage Lockheed Electra that had been modeled closely to Earhart’s 10E. They also took thousands of photographs of the plane to have on file to compare with any debris we might find on the seafloor during the mission. Our flight re-construction team also tapped their own perspective and experience as pilots to try and predict the steps that Earhart and Noonan may have taken during the last hours of their flight. This direct experience combined with time spent in modern flight simulators and pouring over thousands of historical documents, helped crystallize their theories concerning the events that took place in July of 1937, and resulted in a 2500-square-mile search area.

During our 4-day transit to the search site, the CAT 2 operations team used the time to refine the search area provided by our aviation investigators into a workable survey grid. In order to cover the 2500-square-mile area as efficiently as possible, we had to determine the best strategy for laying out Deep Ocean Transponders and leapfrogging the AUVs through the search area. The team had to take into account the time needed for launching and recovering AUVs, setting transponders, and efficiently running the ship back and forth between these operations. In the end, with all of these factors carefully weighed, the search area was broken down into 88 mission boxes, each covering roughly 24 square miles and representing a single 23-hour AUV sortie. After over a year of preparation and research, we had our final search grid laid out and were steaming full speed ahead towards our first AUV launch at the site.

In addition to our search for Amelia, the CAT 2 team put together a plan to carry out biological sampling while the vehicles were busy surveying. During our first transit to the site, Harbor Branch’s Project Manager, Lee Frey, led the team in fine-tuning the deployment of a trawl net that the science team would use for catching specimens.

After a long transit from American Samoa, the team arrived at the south end of the 2500 square-mile search area. Their first task on site was deploying an array of four Deep Ocean Transponders (DOTs). The DOTs work in concert at depth with the AUV’s navigation system to give the vehicle a precise fix on its location at all times using sonar pings. The DOT configuration consists of two bright yellow flotation spheres attached by a long line to the transponder itself, which is then followed by another stretch of line and a weight to anchor the entire set-up on the seafloor. Later, after the AUVs have finished surveying a particular area and no target has been found, a command is sent to the DOT from the surface that tells it to release the weight. The transponder and flotation spheres float to the surface, where they are recovered alongside the ship by team members using a boathook. The transponders are then re-configured and dropped farther up the line in the search grid, where they await the next AUV sortie.

Launching a 2000-pound AUV is a lot simpler than you might think. The AUV operations team first performs a diagnostic checkout on the vehicle’s electronics and instruments to insure that all systems are ready for deployment and functioning properly. Once the pre-dive checklist is complete, the AUV is winched out onto the back deck via a set of removable rails onto the LARS – or Launch and Recovery System. The LARS is a portable cradle and A-frame designed specifically for these AUVs and can be mounted on nearly any research vessel. Once the AUV is sitting on the LARS, it is secured into the docking head. The LARS frame then hydraulically lifts the vehicle up and out over the stern of the ship where it can be safely lowered into the water. After being released from the LARS, the AUV is towed behind the ship until we reach our launch point. At that time, a descent weight is sent overboard and the AUV begins its journey of more than 3 miles down to the seafloor. After launch, the operations team has limited communications ability with the vehicle, but they are able to track the vehicle’s progress via a customized software program that shows the vehicle’s depth and current direction. Team members rotate throughout each 23-hour sortie to maintain constant observation of the AUVs at depth.

The Waitt Institute’s CATALYST AUVs took roughly 3 hours to dive to a depth of nearly 4 miles below the ocean’s surface. The AUV would then use side-scan sonar to map the ocean floor in long over-lapping lanes, referred to as “mowing the lawn.” At the end of a sortie, the AUV would then drop a small weight and begin its climb to the surface.