Seabed Coverage Path Re-Routing for an Autonomous Surface Vehicle

An Autonomous Surface Vehicle (ASV) equipped with a sonar sensor is used to survey seabed. As a ASV sails an offshore region guided by a coverage path, the unit collects sonar data utilized to map the seabed of the region. However, a sonar sensor occasionally fails to provide data with an adequate quality for the mapping. This calls the necessity of re-routing compared to the original path assigned to an operating ASV, as the ASV needs to re-visit the areas where the sensor data is inadequate. Motivated by the fact, we address the issues in the ASV re-routing from scheduling perspective and propose an approach to solve the problem.