China’s first deep manned submersible, JIAOLONG

Abstract

A deep manned submersible is indispensable to deep ocean exploration. No other equipment can bring scientists to extreme sea floor depths to do research in situ. Marine geology, seafloor geophysics, marine biology, and oceanic chemistry are the fields that scientists are particularly eager to study [1][2][3][4][5][6]. Chinese scientists have long dreamed of using their own submersible to probe the deep sea. China's recent fast development of a deep manned submersible has realized that dream.A project, "Development of a Manned Deep Submersible", now named JIAOLONG, was formally started in 2003. After different stages of conceptual design, preliminary design, detailed design, construction, assembly, and open water tank test, the sea trials were conducted at depth of 1000 m in 2009 and 3000 m in 2010. Mission, design and specificationsThe main mission of the submersible is to carry scientists, engineers and their various instruments to the rugged deep sea topography to perform tasks of oceanic geology, geophysics, biology, and chemistry in operational modes of constant height cruising above the sea bottom, hovering at a designated position in mid-water, or resting on the sea bottom.The submersible may conduct many kinds of tasks. Some of them are: (1) to take samples of the deposits, swimming creatures at a required location; (2) to take core samples by means of a mini-drill in areas of cobalt-rich crust; (3) to measure the temperature and take water samples at the center of an active hydrothermal vent or any designated target;(4) to make high resolution topographic and geomorphological maps with a bathymetric side-scan sonar, with the submersible tracing the topography and cruising at a constant height above the bottom; (5) to take pictures and make videos of specific targets, such as marine wrecks; and (6) to deploy or recover devices in a specific location or to inspect and maintain marine structures such as pipelines and cables.Main design considerations: (1) Cost effective principle: to obtain as much data and as many samples as possible and let as many scientists as possible participate in the deep dives.(2) Environmentally friendly principle: to cruise as quietly as possible in the water and to throw as less contaminated drops as possible to the seabed. (3) Convenient and easy to assemble and maintain principle. (4) Ergonomics principle: to provide a comprehensive solution to its operation and observation capabilities in a manner as relaxing as possible so as to minimize fatigue for the pilot and scientists during their long working hours in the submersible at great depths. (5) Sea states: to be able to launch under sea state 4 and recover under sea state 5.Many contributions were made by the Chinese engineers and scientists from all related fields in order to fulfill the mission, the tasks, and the design principles. The molded lines, resistance analysis, hydrodynamic layout, maneuverability, descending and ascending tests without power supply, etc. were carried out during different stages of the conceptual ...

Human reliability analysis for manned submersible diving process based on CREAM and Bayesian network

“…Finally, we estimate probabilities of the root nodes and then reason about the conditional probability table of the entire network. 28 After the task steps are listed, hazard identification and risk analysis are performed using historical data 29,30 and decision methods to identify possible human errors and explore their forming factors. At the same time, we use the what-if analysis to analyze how the operations of submarines may be affected when uncertainties change.…”

Development of a Virtual Platform for Telepresence Control of an Underwater Manipulator Mounted on a Submersible Vehicle

“…1. The carrier can be controlled in movement with six DOFs in the 3-D space, which includes three translational motions (surge, heave, and sway) and three rotational motions (roll, pitch, and yaw) [18]. The virtual model of "Jiaolong" is mainly composed of the main body, propellers, pan-tilt, camera, stabilizer fin, access/excess hatch, headlamps, observation windows, a sampling basket, etc.…”

Trajectory tracking control for manned submersible system with disturbances via disturbance characterization index approach

“…China's first deep‐sea manned submersible named “JIAOLONG” carried out its sea trials at maximum depth of 7000 m in 2012. It is able to cover more than 99.0% of the ocean area around the world …”

“…It is able to cover more than 99.0% of the ocean area around the world. 2 As we know, manned submersibles always work in complicated ocean environment, such as time-varying ocean currents, waves, tides, and upward or downward streams. Moreover, manned submersibles are known as nonlinear dynamic systems subject to various external disturbances and model uncertainties.…”