A lowering represents a discrete submersible deployment, ROV dive, or mooring cast that occurs within a cruise. Lowering support must be enabled in the OpenVDM configuration before it is available in the web interface.

Enabling Lowering Components

In the web UI navigate to Configuration → Main → Edit Current Cruise and enable Show Lowering Components. This activates the lowering menu and causes collection system transfers with Cruise or Lowering set to Lowering to be scoped to individual lowering directories.

Lowering Directory Structure

Each lowering gets its own subdirectory inside the configured lowering base directory (default: Vehicle/):

<cruiseID>/
└── Vehicle/
    ├── J0001/
    │   ├── OpenRVDAS/
    │   └── ...
    └── J0002/
        └── ...

1. Setup New Lowering

Web UI: Configuration → Main → Setup New Lowering

Provide the Lowering ID and optional metadata (start time, location, etc.). OpenVDM will:

  1. Create <cruiseID>/Vehicle/<loweringID>/ and all required lowering subdirectories.
  2. Initialise the lowering section of the MD5 summary.
  3. Export the current lowering configuration.
  4. Run any commands configured under postSetupNewLowering.

2. Active Lowering

During the lowering, collection system transfers scoped to Lowering will write data into <cruiseID>/Vehicle/<loweringID>/. Cruise-scoped transfers continue writing to the cruise-level directories unaffected.

3. Finalize Current Lowering

Web UI: Configuration → Main → Finalize Current Lowering

  1. Runs post-hook commands under preFinalizeCurrentLowering.
  2. Runs every lowering collection system transfer one last time
  3. Updates the MD5 summary for the lowering directory.
  4. Exports a final lowering configuration snapshot.
  5. Runs post-hook commands under postFinalizeCurrentLowering.

After finalization the lowering is marked complete. A new lowering can then be set up for the next dive.

Lowering ID Conventions

Lowering IDs typically follow vessel-specific conventions:

  • S0001 — Vehicle prefix followed by 4-digit sequential number

The lowering ID appears in directory names and exported filenames, so use the official dive number assigned by the vehicle team.

Updated: