VideoRay Explores USS Arizona

The eight pound VideoRay ROV took a leading role last September in a mission with the National Geographic Society and the National Park Service.

The VideoRay entered the USS Arizona, a brute of a battleship that sank in less than nine minutes during the attack on Pearl Harbor on December 7th, 1941. Taking 1,177 lives, the USS Arizona has come to symbolize the start of World War II for America.

Tiny and maneuverable, the ROV was identified by the team as small enough not to disturb the archeological integrity of the wreck and able to fit into even the most confined places. The VideoRay sneaked through portholes, air ducts, manholes, and openings created by the bomb blasts.

Two Missions

The goals of the mission were to perform a complete corrosion status survey of the internal structure of the Arizona, and to pinpoint the sources of the oil that has seeped daily from the wreck since 1941.

A Well-Oiled Machine: Chris Roper of Roper Resources cleans the oil off the ROV after the mission. One of the National Park Service's goals was to survey the oil that has been leaking from the Arizona steadily since 1942. The ship was fully fueled and ready for sea when Pearl Harbor was attacked.

Since 1943, no diver has entered the USS Arizona. President Eisenhower dedicated the site and a memorial monument in 1962, and four archeological surveys were conducted on the Arizona during the 1980s. A National Treasure, the Arizona must be surveyed periodically by the National Park Service, without disturbing her delicate structure which corrodes slowly over time.

Recent detailed maritime archeological assessments and documentation revealed the Arizona to be substantially intact, lying at a five to 10 degree list to port. A 1,760 pound bomb that slammed through her deck, igniting her forward ammunition magazine, delivered the coup de grace. The explosion of ammunition and fuel demolished the forward section of the vessel, which collapsed inside the hull.

Bob Christ, Vice President of VideoRay, traveled to the Arizona Memorial in Hawaii, along with Chris Roper of Roper Resources, photographers and producers from National Geographic, and staff from the National Park Service.

Partners on a mission: Emory Kristof, the head photographer from National Geographic; Bob Christ, VP at VideoRay who flew the ROV through the Arizona; and Keith Moorehead, a field engineer for National Geographic.

With Christ in control, the VideoRay was lowered into the water through the entrance breezeway. With National Parks divers tendering the neutrally buoyant tether on the first deck-level above the hull, the divers were never put at risk or in a position to disturb the wreck site.

Once the VideoRay was in the water, Christ took multiple difficult turns through a dozen access points, including air ducts, manhole covers, portholes, and bomb blast holes. The ROV found passage into four levels of the ship.

Through VideoRay's eye, Christ could see that the second deck was corroding and documented the extent of the structural decay. The cabins on the second deck, with portholes that were closed at the time of the explosion, were in better shape than the cabins with portholes that had been exposed. Here, Christ found the staterooms as they were left on December 7, 1941. In some of the ship's quarters, drawings still lay on desks as if they had been stretched out yesterday. Coat hangers still hung in closets. Tools were laid down, as if ready to be picked up again at any moment.

"When I was flying down in the hallway, suspended mid-cabin, it looked exactly as if I were walking down the hall," Christ said.

Best preserved was one office cabin with a closed porthole and a partly closed door. ”I flew the ROV into the cabin," Christ said. "I could see the writing on the paper diagrams on the desk and was able to gently set the VideoRay down for a closer look."

Diver Matt Russell, an archaeologist with the National Park Service, holds the unit that traveled 60 feet into the bowels of the U.S.S. Arizona.

The thrust of the eight-pound sub was slight, balanced with the neutral buoyancy of the tether, which kept the ROV from stirring up sediment that impairs visibility. Unlike a diver's fins, the submersible's small thrusters did not disturb fragile items exposed to the elements.

At one point as he drove the VideoRay down a hallway, Christ was accompanied by a survivor from the Arizona disaster who was watching the monitor from the monument. "I couldn't help but get a lump in my throat watching this man," said Christ. "He was revisiting another era in time through the eyes of the VideoRay."

Sneaking In and Out

What happens in the ROV gets stuck? In fact, the VideoRay did get in two jams during the mission.

At one point, the light, neutrally buoyant tether coiled up in a small space on the ceiling next to air ducts and stopped the VideoRay in its tracks. Christ swam the ROV back to the place the tether was gathered. Then he guided the VideoRay to the top of the tether pile and pushed down on it with the sub's thruster. The tether was free again, and the extraction maneuvers took only 15 minutes.

"The key is not to panic," said Christ, who once flew work class ROVs for an offshore oil company. "There's always a way out."

Christ completed a survey of a main structural bulkhead on the third deck, and then made his trickiest maneuver to get into the fourth deck. His route to this deck involved three turns down a manhole, a scoot through a bomb blast hole and a door, and ducking into an air duct. This took Christ to the lowest penetration, about 150 feet into the hulk.

"Seeing the everyday things in their places really captured the essence of what this exploration of the Arizona was all about," said Christ. "All I could think of was ghosts as I was flying down the halls with the ROV. It was like people were just there yesterday, and could be back any minute."

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