Satellite-Respondent Buoys Identify Ocean Debris

As part of its ocean-observing work, NASA partnered with NOAA and private industry to develop remote sensing technologies for protecting the seas of the North Pacific from derelict fishing gear. As part of this program, Airborne Technologies Inc. (ATI), of Wasilla, Alaska, developed a system using satellite-respondent buoys to monitor the convergence of currents in order to track high seas debris. ATI has now built over 900 of the buoys, and that original work has also led to the development of a prototype unmanned aircraft system and unique complementary software designed to process ocean images to detect debris fields.