Fugro Trial of New Flagship R.O.V
Fugro, the Dutch technical underwater geological consultancy providing a wide range of on and off-shore investigation services, has conducted the first U.K. open water trial of their FCV 3000, the new flagship R.O.V at the Underwater Centre in Fort William, the UK’s leading commercial diving training centre. It has been built in-house by Fugro and is a highly capable, 5th generation Work Class ROV System built to service their client needs across the global market for ROV operations whether that is in Survey, Inspection, Intervention or specialist Operations.
The Underwater Centre was chosen as the ideal site for the trial due to its world class support facilities, as well as the unique location and topography of Loch Linnhe, one of Scotland’s deepest lochs. The sea loch provided the trials team with realistic sea conditions as well as multiple depths to test the FCV 3000. Due to this, The Underwater Centre is fast becoming the best place for trials for the subsea industry in Europe.
The in-house designed and built FCV 3000 offers the next generation of performance and capability. At the heart of the FCV 3000 is Fugro’s well-proven control and communication system based on single- mode fibre-optic technology. This is complemented by the capability to host 3 HD cameras or 12 conventional cameras, which provide a wide range of communications. However, it is the implementation of the “hidden capability” that will distinguish the Fugro contribution to Remote Technology.
Jim Mann, Global R.O.V. manager at Fugro, comments:
“The Underwater Centre in Fort William has been running R.O.V. courses throughout 2007. We have built a close working relationship with the company during this time. The facilities and support here have been ideal for the first U.K. sea trials of our flagship R.O.V., the FCV 3000. The trials have been a great success and we hope to be back here next year.”
General Manager of The Underwater Centre, Steve Ham, adds;
‘We are delighted to welcome such a prestigious company like Fugro to The Underwater Centre to carry out the trial of the FCV 3000. We believe it is the natural course for ROV testing to be done at the Underwater Centre. We have the expertise in commercial diver training and the facilities necessary to offer the best ROV testing conditions worldwide. We are in a great position here on Loch Linnhe to be able to provide optimal trials opportunities for companies like Fugro. Our location, facilities and experience mean we can really provide the best.’