The 90-foot RUDE is the smallest ship in NOAA's fleet. But it packs a wallop when it comes to national press. Under the direction of then Commander (now Captain) Sam DeBow, the RUDE located the wreckage of TWA Flight 800 in July 1996. Almost exactly three years later, under the command of Lieutenant Commander James Verlaque, the RUDE found John F. Kennedy Jr.'s downed aircraft off the Massachusetts coast.

Last year, the little ship helped make sure that the largest-ever assembly of U.S. and foreign ships could safely transit New York Harbor. RUDE surveyed the harbor and approaches to it, ensuring that National Ocean Service chart makers could update critical navigation charts in record time.

RUDE then represented NOAA during the International Naval Review, an inspection by the President of U.S. naval might. Together with OpSail 2000, this event attracted historic numbers of naval vessels and tall ships. And much to local surprise, RUDE found six sunken vessels during its survey.

But it's the day-to-day work of RUDE that makes it such an essential part of NOAA's fleet. Named for Captain Gilbert T. Rude, inventor of the RUDE Star Finder for locating celestial bodies, the ship surveys the Eastern seaboard to find submerged wrecks, rocks and other underwater navigation hazards. Once collected, this information is used by NOAA chart makers to create the nautical tools so essential to safe navigation. Huge oil tankers, cargo ships, Navy and Coast Guard vessels, and small recreational boats all depend on these charts to move safely along America's coastal waterways.

RUDE's technology has come a long way from the lead lines once used by surveyors to determine the water's depth at a single point. Today RUDE uses side scan sonar in which a small torpedo-shaped "towfish" is towed by the ship. This towfish sends out sound energy and analyzes the return signal which bounces off of the seafloor or a submerged object.

In a side scan, the transmitted energy forms into the shape of a fan that sweeps the seafloor from under the towfish to either side, usually a distance of about 330 feet. The strength of the return echo is continuously recorded, creating a "picture" of the ocean bottom where protruding objects create a dark image. Shadows from these objects create light areas.

Still essential is depth information. This data comes from RUDE's multi-beam sonar, which also provides fan-shaped coverage of the seafloor. But not in the form of images. Rather than continuously recording the strength of the return echo, the multi-beam system measures and records how long it takes an acoustic signal to travel from a transmitter to the seafloor or submerged object and back to the receiver. And this system is mounted on the ship's hull, not towed.

Just days after Lieutenant Commander Andrew Beaver of the NOAA Corps took command of the RUDE on March 9, a reporter went aboard to observe surveys being conducted along Maryland's Chesapeake Bay. Quoting the new commander, the reporter called RUDE small but mighty, and always willing to go the extra mile.



Aboard the RUDE (from left): Captain Sam DeBow, Chief of Hydrographic Surveys Division, National Ocean Service; Rear Admiral Evelyn Fields, Director of Office of Marine and Aviation Operations and NOAA Corps; Captain Ted Lillestolen, Deputy Assistant Administrator, National Ocean Service.

OpSail 2000 - View from the RUDE deck.