There are some closer, albeit deeper mineral treasures off Hawaii. Deep ocean floor has lots of mineral growths, and other countries are working to exploit it.
a crab-bot might be a good way to explore, although handling one of those suction hoses requires a serious bit of weight and control.
> There's a new TV show called Bering Sea Gold : Under the Ice that follows a group of "gold prospectors" dredging for gold under the ice in the Bering Sea. You can see some videos of it at
http://dsc.discovery.com/tv-shows/bering-sea-gold/videos/underwater-b...
> It's very dangerous work.
> There's a sluice box on the boat that separates the gold from all the rest of what they suction up.
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> But down below they actually have to dive down with a high-suction hose and suction up the loose sand (and,hopefully, gold) by hand.
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> I repeat, It can be very dangerous work. One diver got her hand sucked up into the hose. Also, the divers can only work for so long before the extreme cold gets to them. This is the Bering Sea, after all.
> So, I'm thinking, how about an undersea, remotely operated robot to do the dangerous work? I would base it on those simple multi-legged robots, rather than a wheeled robot, so that it can easily traverse the bottom. Add a number of video cameras, attach the suction hose, and you could operate it for hours and hours at a time from the safety and comfort of the boat.
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> We've got plenty of ocean around here in which to test it out. And the Bering Sea is only a short boat ride North. OK, that's a bit of a stretch. But it would be a really interesting project, and possibly very lucrative.
> Anyone up for building a Gold-Bot?
> - Roger Garrett
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