IBM-backed autonomous Mayflower ship begins crewless Atlantic voyage
The autonomous Mayflower ship has left Plymouth, England, for a crewless voyage to Plymouth, Massachusetts.
The vessel is designed as a 21st-century counterpart to the Mayflower that carried settlers from England to Massachusetts in 1620. The new Mayflower, known as Mayflower 2.0, replaces traditional navigation tools with a modern positioning and sensing stack that includes GNSS, SATCOM, radar and lidar. It also uses a wind and solar hybrid propulsion system, supported by a backup diesel generator, rather than relying only on wind power.
The ship’s core capability is edge artificial intelligence, which allows it to navigate and conduct scientific work even when it has no connection to shore. Its AI captain was developed by MarineAI and uses IBM artificial intelligence systems to identify obstacles and objects in the water, including ships, boats, debris, land hazards and marine life. The navigation software was trained for practical conditions at sea, including the need to ignore seagulls that could otherwise appear as large objects and trigger unnecessary evasive action.
The departure followed weather guidance from The Weather Company, which IBM acquired in 2016, after the vessel received clearance to begin its crossing. IBM has also built a dashboard to track the ship’s progress, while live video from onboard cameras is supported by Videosoft, a company focused on streaming from difficult environments. The stream can operate at very low bandwidth, but it may still drop out when the vessel is fully disconnected.
Mayflower 2.0 is also carrying sensors for scientific research, including acoustic, nutrient, temperature, water and air sampling systems. Edge devices on board will store and analyse data locally until a connection becomes available, then upload it to edge nodes onshore. The voyage will test whether autonomous vessels can make safe navigation decisions and gather useful ocean data on long missions where human crews and constant connectivity are not available.