With state-of-the-art coastal survey vessel Orion, Substructure conducts multibeam hydrographic surveys to International Hydrographic Organization (IHO) Special Order standards.

Designed and outfitted by Substructure engineers and technicians, trailerable Orion enables fast mobilizations on nearshore water, as well as on inland lakes, rivers, and reservoirs. Orion also has A-frame and davit attachments, a large working deck, and an open transom, making it well suited to support a variety of survey, sampling, and instrument deployment/recovery operations.

Under well-controlled conditions, Substructure can produce repeatable vertical resolution on the order of only a few centimeters, accuracies that can be critical for dredging volume computations, seafloor-change evaluations, and engineering and structural assessments.

Orion’s uncommon accuracy and versatility reflects Substructure’s deep hydrographic and structural survey experience, as well as a dogged attention to detail throughout the design/build process, which included reducing hull twist, minimizing engine and electrical noise, placing and aligning sensors with high precision, and optimizing transducer location to minimize surface noise. These design details, along with the ability to apply real-time kinematic Differential Global Positioning System (DGPS) tidal corrections and also acquire frequent speed–of-sound casts, enable Substructure to obtain data exceeding IHO Special Order standards.

Designed around a system of Substructure-owned multibeam survey components, Orion also is readily adaptable to integration with advanced sensors as they are developed. Survey techniques routinely employed during geophysical field operations include multibeam bathymetry, side-scan SONAR and multibeam backscatter imaging, acoustic sub-bottom profiling, magnetic anomaly profiling, sediment profile imaging, underwater video imaging (towed and remotely operated vehicles), and a variety of sediment sampling and coring techniques. 

During water-column-measurement operations, these same techniques may be supplemented with a variety of surface- or bottom-mounted arrays, which might include current meters, water-level gauges, conductivity/temperature/depth probes, and a wide variety of other sensors.

Learn more at Hydrographic and Structural Surveys.