Webinar: Deep Water AUV/ROV Surveys for WWII Underwater Cultural Heritage in the Saipan Channel
Date/Time: Tuesday November 21, 2024 | 2-3 PM ET
Speaker: Dr. Andrew Pietruszka, Scripps Institution of Oceanography, Underwater Archaeologist
In February 2022, members of Scripps Institution of Oceanography conducted an exploratory ocean survey using autonomous underwater vehicles (AUVs) and a remotely operated vehicle (ROV) to locate and document multiple U.S. WWII B-29 aircraft that crashed offshore Tinian and Saipan, Commonwealth of the Northern Mariana Islands (CNMI). The airbases, constructed in the final year of WWII, played a pivotal role in the war’s outcome by supporting thousands of B-29 long range missions to Japan, with 13 losses reported in the nearby waters. This talk explores the historical context of the CNMI in WWII, project methodology, and results with an emphasis on the use of AUVs and other marine technologies for deepwater archaeological survey.
About the Speakers: Andrew Pietruszka is an underwater archaeologist at the Scripps Institution of Oceanography – University of California, San Diego specializing in the search, documentation, and recovery of U.S. service members missing in action due to our nation’s past conflicts. He received an M.A. in Underwater Archaeology/Maritime Studies from East Carolina University and a Ph.D. in Anthropology from Syracuse University.
In 2011, Dr. Pietruszka joined the Defense POW/MIA Accounting Agency as a forensic archaeologist overseeing underwater recovery operations. In 2015, he served as the interim director of DPAA’s laboratory at Offutt Air Force Base in Omaha, Nebraska. In 2016 he left public service for an academic research position at the University of Delaware. Since 2016, he has served as the lead archaeologist for Project Recover—a collaborative effort to enlist 21st-century science and technology to find and repatriate American MIAs.