SnotBot: A whale of a deep-learning project

It's a beautiful morning on the waters of Alaska's Peril Strait — clear, calm, silent, and just a little cool. A small but seaworthy research vessel glides through gentle swells. Suddenly, in the distance, a humpback whale the size of a school bus explodes out of the water. Enormous bursts of air and water jet out of its blowholes like a fire hose, the noise echoing between the banks. • “Blow at eleven o'clock!” cries the lookout, and the small boat swarms with activity. A crew member wearing a helmet and cut-proof gloves raises a large quadcopter drone over his head, as if offering it to the sun, which glints off the half dozen plastic petri dishes velcroed to the drone. • Further back in the boat, the drone pilot calls, “Starting engines in 3, 2, 1! Takeoff in 3, 2, 1!” The drone's engines buzz as it zooms 20 meters into the air and then darts off toward where the whale just dipped below the water's surface. With luck, the whale will spout again nearby, and the drone will be there when it does.