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THE PAST BELOW THE WAVES More than three million shipwrecks are believed to lie on the seabed, the result of storms and accidents during thousands of years of sea-borne trading.These wrecks offer marine archaeologists valuable information about the culture, technology and trade patterns of ancient civilisations, but the vast majority have been too deep to research.Scuba divers can only operate down to 50 metres, which limits operations to wrecks near the coast, which have often been damaged by storms or plant growth.

THE PAST BELOW THE WAVES More than three million shipwrecks are believed to lie on the seabed, the result of storms and accidents during thousands of years of sea-borne trading. These wrecks offer marine archaeologists valuable information about the culture, technology and trade patterns of ancient civilisations, but the vast majority have been too deep to research. Scuba divers can only operate down to 50 metres, which limits operations to wrecks near the coast, which have often been damaged by storms or plant growth. A few deep sea sites (such as the Titanic) have been explored by manned submarines, but this kind of equipment has been too expensive for less famous subjects. However, this situation has been changed by the introduction of a new kind of mini submarine: the automatic underwater vehicle (AUV). This cheap, small craft is free moving and does not need an expensive mother-ship to control it. Now a team of American archaeologists are planning to use an AUV to explore an area of sea north of Egypt which was the approach to a major trading port 4,000 years ago.