Where's Waldo (the Submarine)?

stoolpigeon writes "Scientists on Florida's Gulf Coast are trying to find an underwater robot that has mysteriously vanished. The robot from the Mote Marine Laboratory in Sarasota has been missing since Monday. The robot, which cost about $100,000, was equipped with a detector to find red tide, a toxic algae bloom. The detector was valued at another $30,000. Scientists aren't sure what happened to the robot, which is nicknamed Waldo."

For Future Reference...

[istartedi]

...quit naming stuff "Waldo". You won't have this problem.

Re:For Future Reference...

[FlyingSquidStudios]

They could have gone with the original idea and called it Hoffa...

Re:For Future Reference...

[palegray.net]

Obligatory [lmnotees.com] response.

Re:For Future Reference...

[maugle]

Could've been worse. Could've named it "Carmen Sandiego".

Re:

[memristance]

Well, at least then they could've used Rockapella for echolocation...

Re:

[Louis Savain]

Ha ha. Old timer. Played with Fortran or COBOL lately?

Re:

[skine]

At least with Carmen Sandiego, we get clues about the loot, warrant and crook, and are able to track down the V.I.L.E. henchmen that will lead us to her.

Personally, I blame RoboCrook, but maybe we should ask (the one and only) Plastic Diver Guy.

Re:For Future Reference...

[BACPro]

Waldo is one of a treo of subs.
The others are named Nemo and Carmen.

Re:

[icannotthinkofaname]

*trio

If serious, [citation needed].

If silly, please get modded +5, Funny. That was a nice one. :)

Re:

[Anonymous Coward]

No, he's serious.

This link [mote.org] was provided by a previous poster.

Waldo - along with two other AUVs nicknamed Carmen and Nemo - has been "on the job" for Mote since 2005

Re:

[palegray.net]

Ask and ye shall receive. [youtube.com]

Re:

[Cookie3]

Or.... the daughter of Waldo AND Carmen Sandiego?

http://www.tailsteak.com/archive.php?num=433 [tailsteak.com]

Re:

[rhyder128k]

The USS Economy.

Re:

[Anonymous Coward]

Partial list of names you should not use:
- Waldo
- Nemo
- Titanic

Re:

[Anonymous Coward]

And then they stuck it in the middle of a red tide. You'd think they'd know better.

Re:

[Rennt]

I think you sig should read "For all intents and purposes".

However I will concede the possibility I missed the point of your little joke. This is why was not so bold as to "fix that for you".

Re:

[nacturation]

I think his sig is grammar bait.

Re:

[Rennt]

I'm afraid it was (begs the question?!). Stylishly done.

Re:

[evilviper]

I think you sig should read "For all intents and purposes".

Actually, it should be: "for all intensive porpoises".

Re:

[i_liek_turtles]

Oh, come on, it can't be that hard to find a red and white striped robot.

Nomen est omen.

[Sumbius]

Nomen est omen. Great, it must be half way to Mexico by now.

Re:

[ZeRu]

Waldo isn't such a terrible name actually. He always can be found with some effort.

Re:

[56ker]

Even scientists need pet names for things. Anyway Waldo is supposed to detect red tides. So Waldo is probably wherever there is a red tide (or somewhere one is likely to be). Look for te red tide, find Waldo!

Mind you Waldo might be out finding the red and white striped tide in order to hide better. :P

Hrmm

[Kratisto]

You'd think it would be pretty easy to find a red and white striped submarine; though I guess it's currently surrounded by hundreds of other submarines, some of which are painted red and white.

Re:

[Fiddlingfrog]

Only the one with a bobble hat and glasses is the real sub.

Re:

[Anonymous Coward]

It's all about the cane

Re:

[HeronBlademaster]

Don't forget the shoes!

Fish Story

[Cassini2]

Catching a submarine ... that would be the ultimate fish story!

Re:

[Sulphur]

A couple of years ago, there was a trawler in the Pacific that got entangled with a sub. That was a Pacific sub. They did not land it.

--

Off Florida, the shark jumps you.

Lost

[Runaway1956]

Waldo got lost, is all. I've been working all day to unclog the toilet. It was WALDO, trying to get out of the sewer!! I'm gonna sue, I tell you - they should have given him a Debian operating system! Microsoft streets, for God's sake!

Re:

[Frosty Piss]

Or maybe it's humping COCAINE from South America now...

Re:

[MRe_nl]

http://www.goatworthy.net/waldo%20wanted.jpg [goatworthy.net]

Comment removed

[account_deleted]

Comment removed based on user account deletion

Re:

[choongiri]

Hmmm, they should have been more careful with their remote access permissions...

choongiri@waldo:~$ cat robots.txt

User-agent: AmericanFreedomBot
Disallow:

User-agent: BadChineseBot
Disallow: /secret-c-and-c-stuff/

Re:

[PC and Sony Fanboy]

Before you know it Waldo could be humping a Chinese trawler off the coast of Taiwan called the Red Bloom

What if it was humping with an organic? Baby shark/robots?

Re:

[maninthespoon]

What if it was humping with an organic? Baby shark/robots?

So that's how they get their lasers!

Better links

[mjensen]

http://www.cfnews13.com/News/Local/2009/9/5/where39s_waldo_the_answer_could_net_you_500.html [cfnews13.com]
and
http://www.mote.org/index.php?src=news&submenu=NEWS&srctype=detail&category=Newsroom&refno=295 [mote.org]

$500 reward for finding it....

Re:

[Merls the Sneaky]

$500 only, it's worth 130 000 bucks and only $500 reward.

Tight gits.

Re:

[religious freak]

That was my first thought as well, but this is science after all. The $500 is probably a collection of money out of the personal wallets of broke grad students' pizza fund. Granted, they're the ones who lost it, but a little sympathy may be in order...

Re:

[ferd_farkle]

From the above link:
"The robot was last seen near Venice Beach about 12 miles offshore and 100 feet underwater."

WTF?

Some passerby happened upon it "100 feet underwater"?

stolen

[Iamthecheese]

let a hundred thousand dollars of hardware loose without tracking it properly or securing it and tell the world where it is. hmmmmmm

Re:

[Anonymous Coward]

They'll find it washed up on the beach with the rims and stereo missing.

Tether?

[Scutter]

Don't robotic submersibles usually have tethers of some sort for power and communications?

Re:

[Zero__Kelvin]

"Don't robotic submersibles usually have tethers of some sort for power and communications?"

1962 Called. They want their technology back.

Re:

[Scutter]

1962 Called. They want their technology back.

1998 called. They want their annoying memes back.

Re:

[Zero__Kelvin]

"1962 Called. They want their technology back.

1998 called. They want their annoying memes back.

I have no doubt you are in a position to return them both, spanky.

Re:Tether?

[Yvan256]

2009 called. They want the time they lost reading your posts back.

Re:

[Anonymous Coward]

well the jerkstore called, and they're running out of you!

Re:

[Tobenisstinky]

Seriously Funny!

Re:Tether?

[mibus]

2009 called. They want THEIR SUBMARINE back :)

Re:

[TheGothicGuardian]

Are you implying that Waldo got lost in time? That would put an interesting twist on the books, only having him appear at a certain time.

Re:

[ectotherm]

Has anyone bothered to check eBay?? ;-)

Re:

[RegularFry]

Since you don't seem to have had a serious answer yet, I'm guessing from the photo and the duty cycle that it's a Slocum glider. These have no tether, and are (pretty much) fully autonomous. Google is your friend - they're a really neat design.

Re:

[societyofrobots]

Its autonomous, as all AUVs (autonomous underwater vehicles) are.

They probably just mis-programmed it to go in the wrong direction (a very common mistake with AUVs).

As all AUVs are positively buoyant, it should be floating somewhere just waiting to be found within a radius of its power supply.

What did they expect?

[ShooterNeo]

The submarine is self guided, with no tether, and runs on batteries. The sea is a very harsh environment...one has to expect to lose a few. $100,000 isn't really that much money, and I suspect that there recovery efforts will be fairly limited.

Re:

[MrMista_B]

$100,000 isn't really that much money?

Hmm...

Got a couple dozens of thousands you could give me? I, uh, need the to, uh... get a coffee. Don't worry, it's not really expensive.

Re:What did they expect?

[ShooterNeo]

How much do you think it costs per day to send a ship out to look for the robot submarine?

About ten grand a day.

[proslack]

Depends on the size of the ship. The daily rate for the R/V Suncoaster [usf.edu], a 100-foot research vessel that could handle this sort of search and recovery mission (assuming a few extra sonar-type add-ons), exclusive of fuel, is about $3,500 per day. Fuel would probably add about $5,000 per day if running at full speed, which is unlikely if searching for something. The above costs include crew salaries but not the salaries of researchers who might be assisting in the search; that would probably add another $1,000

Re:

[ShooterNeo]

That's my point. It's not worth spending more than a day or two, at most, looking for the sub. Any longer than that and it would be more cost effective spending the money on a new one.

They forgot

[captnbmoore]

To turn the bilge pump to auto and it drained the batteries down and ut sank.

Look for lots of submarines all in one place

[eccenthink]

Obviously Waldo is surrounded by lots of other submarines that are similar in appearance to the submarine they need to find. So, start by looking for someplace that has several hundred submarines all in one location. Once you find that then all you have to do is pick out the one that looks like Waldo.

Re:

[Yvan256]

But I thought that the submarine was impervious to shark attacks and that only lasers could do any dam...

Oh shit.

Waldo the Submarine

[Chris Burke]

Picture it.

The last page of the last book. There, a surprise, instead of the usual page-filling drawing of intricate details, once intriguing and exciting but now just annoying and yawn-inducing, there's only a corner with the usual crowd next to a lake. A deep lake that you can see into; its depths cover most of the page. Where's Waldo?

There he is. At the bottom of the lake. Still, cold, and alone.

Aaaaahhhh. Sweet closure.

Ok. I Got a Theory

[Louis Savain]

My theory is that some Mexican or Columbian drug cartel needed a safe way to retrieve bundles of dope dropped off the coast of Florida and floating right below the surface of the water. What (who?) would be better suited for the job than Waldo? I'm sure Waldo is sporting a new black coating by now.

Submarine folks should know better than naming their craft any name other than Nemo. Serves them right. Besides, Waldo is probably a code name for a cocaine mule in that part of the country.

It just goes to show ya

Locate using GPS ?

[shashark]

I'm just wondering if GPS would work underwater. Though even if it did, being batter powered would make it useless if the batteries are drained.

Re:Locate using GPS ?

[BungaDunga]

Water absorbs the radio waves you need to use to triangulate your position, so GPS doesn't work underwater. They put GPS tags on whales and things, but they only work when the whale surfaces.

Re:Locate using GPS ?

[dangitman]

Though even if it did, being batter powered would make it useless if the batteries are drained.

It's a robotic submarine, not a deep-fried fish. Although I can understand the confusion.

Did you look up?

[SEWilco]

First I heard of Waldo, he was in orbit. Maybe they're looking in the wrong place.

Why don't they...

[Zaurus]

Why don't they just make a $250,000 submersible to go and find it?

Why not just ...

[tweewo]

ping?

Re:

[Yetihehe]

No route to host [bash.org]

Squid

[PinkyGigglebrain]

Or it just got caught in a fishing net, wreck, seaweed, mud, giant jellyfish, take your pick. This thing is un-powered and is made to "glide" in the water, you could stop it dead with a high test fishing line or kelp plant.

mysteriously vanished?

[fahrbot-bot]

They shouldn't kid themselves. Waldo's been planning this escape for months...

Sorry for the loss

[cyberzephyr]

But did they think about having it insured. If they did then they are only bitching about lost DATA.

It was a private little ceremony...

[FauxReal]

According to my admittedly un-scientific calculations, it most likely eloped with a giant squid.

Gulp!

[Saba]

Terror from the deep...

In R'lyeh...

[Majestix]

...great Waldthulu lies dreaming. Waiting for the stars to align just so.

Nomen est Omen

[Fizzl]

FARNSWORTH
I've booked us all on the maiden voyage
of the largest, most luxurious space

Send the -other- Waldo after it

[hughbar]

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Waldo_(short_story) [wikipedia.org] anyone mention this yet? It is a 'waldo', sort of...

I for one...

[wvmarle]

welcome our new robotic underwaterlords!

Based on movie evidence...

[AliasMrAlias]

obviously has been eaten by some kind of Mega Shark. Or possibly a Giant Octopus

Couldn't they get hit for more than $500

[sa1lnr]

If somebody finds it and claims salvage?

Florida

[StormReaver]

Given the sub's proximity to the Bermuda Triangle, it's obvious that it was kidnapped by time traveling aliens living among us in order to probe its lower ports.

Re:

[conlaw]

I hate to break this to you but Sarasota is on the west coast of Florida and Bermuda is off the east coast. The Everglades, which is full of alligators and pythons, lies between them.

It's obvious . . .

[Better.Safe.Than.Sor]

It's covertly delivering cocaine to Columbia.

It's obvious...

[fullymodo]

A seagoing robot for detecting dangerous algae blooms?
It was almost certainly captured by Morgan Industries.

No matey, I havn't seen your sub...

[Composite_Armor]

But i do have one for sale just like it.
Geeyarr harr harr..