Patent 9038557 was granted and assigned to Raytheon on May, 2015 by the United States Patent and Trademark Office.
A hull robot is disclosed for operation on a surface of a hull of a vessel. The robot can include a drive subsystem onboard the robot for driving and maneuvering the robot about the hull. A sensor subsystem onboard the robot can sense an attachment state of the robot to the hull. The attachment state can include at least one of attached and detached. A signal generation subsystem onboard the robot can emit a distress signal when the attachment state is detached.