UAV-Supported Maritime Search System: Experience from Valun Bay Field Trials

2026-02-09

AI Summary

This work proposes an end-to-end autonomous maritime search system to address the low efficiency and poor robustness of floating object detection in complex oceanic environments. The system uniquely integrates high-fidelity flow field reconstruction driven by computational fluid dynamics with dynamic probabilistic modeling, multi-UAV cooperative search control, and deep learning–based object detection, further enhanced by real-time drifter data for online optimization. Field trials conducted under realistic sea conditions in Valun Bay, Croatia, demonstrated the system’s ability to reliably and efficiently locate floating targets, thereby validating its practicality and robustness in uncertain marine environments.

Technology Category

• Search and Optimization: Learning to Search
• Intelligent Robots: State Estimation
• Constraint Satisfaction and Optimization: Search

Application Category

• Systems and Infrastructure for Web, Mobile and WoT: Experiences and lessons learnt from Web-based algorithms and system deployments
• Search and Retrieval-Augmented AI: Web learning to rank, online learning, and counterfactual learning for ranking
• Responsible Web: Machine-in-the-loop, human agency and autonomy

Abstract

This paper presents the integration of flow field reconstruction, dynamic probabilistic modeling, search control, and machine vision detection in a system for autonomous maritime search operations. Field experiments conducted in Valun Bay (Cres Island, Croatia) involved real-time drifter data acquisition, surrogate flow model fitting based on computational fluid dynamics and numerical optimization, advanced multi-UAV search control and vision sensing, as well as deep learning-based object detection. The results demonstrate that a tightly coupled approach enables reliable detection of floating targets under realistic uncertainties and complex environmental conditions, providing concrete insights for future autonomous maritime search and rescue applications.

Problem

• maritime search
• autonomous UAV
• floating target detection
• environmental uncertainty
• search and rescue

Innovation

• flow field reconstruction
• dynamic probabilistic modeling
• multi-UAV search control
• deep learning-based object detection
• autonomous maritime search