The Mayflower ship played a crucial role in American colonial history. In August 1620, the Mayflower set sail from Southampton, England, to Plymouth, Massachusetts. The 100-foot-long, triple-masted wooden vessel with canvas sails traveled more than two months to cross the Atlantic more than 400 years ago. It carried 102 English passengers, known today as Pilgrims. It sailed with a maximum speed of three knots or about 6 kilometers per hour and was manned by 30 crew members.
Did you know that another Mayflower crossed the Atlantic earlier this month? But its namesake could be different in every single way. The one similarity was that it was also a boat. The difference? This time, an autonomous ship crosses the Atlantic without a human crew.
Autonomous Ship Crosses The Atlantic Ocean — The Mayflower 400’s Journey
Known as the Mayflower 400, the 50-foot-long trimaran can go up to 10 knots or 18.5 kilometers an hour. It is powered by solar-powered electric motors with diesel as a backup if needed. And the required number of crew is zero.
This time, the human crew is not essential because an on-board artificial intelligence navigated the ship. Like a self-driving car, the vessel was tricked out with six cameras and 45 sensors to handle the AI information about its surroundings and help it make smart navigation decisions, including rerouting around spots with lousy weather. Plus, there’s an on-board radar, GPS, and altitude and water-depth detectors.
The voyage to the Atlantic is a collaboration between IBM and ProMare, a marine research non-profit corporation.
Engineers trained the AI Captain of Mayflower 400’s on petabytes of data. Based on the IBM overview of the ship, its decisions depend on “if/the” rules and machine learning models for pattern recognition and go beyond these standards. The algorithm “learns from the outcomes of its decisions, makes predictions, manages risks, and refines its knowledge through experience.” It’s also able to integrate far more inputs in real-time than a human is capable of.
The training included teaching the algorithm to identify objects in its paths, such as fishing vessels, cargo ships, or shipping containers floating in the water.
Despite all its training and preparation, the Mayflower 400 fell slightly short of its objective.
It set sail from Plymouth, England, on April 29 and was meant to take three weeks to arrive in Washington, DC—but a mechanical issue derailed it to the Canadian port of Halifax. There are no further details, but it may have been similar to the ship’s first attempted journey in 2021 when a metal component on the backup generator fractured. Solar power alone was not sufficient for the vessel to complete its voyage.
Moving Ahead
The Mayflower 400’s engineers will continue exploring ways to achieve their goals. They are already planning another voyage for the AI-driven robot ship. Despite the challenges, it’s pretty amazing to contemplate how far technology has come since the original Mayflower crossed the Atlantic.
It makes you think about what a similar voyage will look like 400 years later. Anything is possible, from hydrogen-powered airships to civilian submarines to faster, sleeker AI-powered solar vessels. Soon, we will hear news about how an autonomous ship crossed the Atlantic successfully.
Mayflower 400’s Project director Brett Phaneuf announced the IBM technology “remained to function accordingly. They will push through with the plan – the boat will sail to Plymouth, Massachusetts, and then to Washington DC.
“The journey she made was difficult and has taught several things about designing, building, and operating this type of ship, as well as the future of the maritime enterprise,” Phaneuf said.
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