A team of young engineers from a Dundee school have triumphed in the annual Scotland-finals of a global oil and gas competition at Robert Gordon University.
The pupils from Grove Academy in Broughty Ferry will now travel to Seattle in the USA to compete in the international final.
The Grove Acad team triumphed in the Scottish MATE ROV competition against nine other school teams – mostly from Grampian – by putting their underwater robot – which they had designed and built – through a series of missions to win a place in the international final.
Grove Academy emerged victorious after a panel of industry experts scored the teams on how well they completed the missions, as well as taking into consideration the technical reports, poster displays, and engineering presentations the pupils were required to produce.
The team from Alford Academy picked up the second place and Keith Grammar, winners from last year’s competition, took the third spot.
This year, the pupils were responding to a task based around aircraft, earthquake and energy and had to create an ROV which could operate in the salt and fresh water areas in the Pacific Northwest.
The specific tasks for the 2018 challenge included – locating the wreckage of a vintage airplane and returning its engine to the surface; installing or recovering a seismometer; and installing a tidal turbine and instrumentation to monitor the environment.
The major STEM initiative aims to inspire future engineers through hands-on experience of designing (ROVs) used underwater in the oil and gas, defence, oceanology and marine renewables industries.
To date, Scottish MATE ROV has worked with more than 500 pupils from over 40 schools over the past 11 years.
It is one of 30 regional heats held around the world by the Marine Advanced Technology Education (MATE) Centre in California and will now see the Grove Academy team travel frae Brochty Ferry to compete in this year’s international final which will be held at Weyerhauser King County Aquatic Centre in Federal Way, Washington.
Ps
The Editor of Scottish Energy News strongly admits to entire bias in congratulating the winning finalist team at Grove Academy as a former pupil at the pre-eminent Dundee school (1971-1976)!
30 Apr 2018
http://www.ScottishEnergyNews.com Dundee schools break north-east ‘stranglehold’ on finalists for subsea ‘Rovop Wars’ competition in USA: Come on Grove Academy!
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