Pupils from Peterhead Academy triumphed in a Scotland-wide competition to design and test offshore robots.
The Scottish MATE ROV challenge, which is hosted annually by Robert Gordon University, pitted teams from nine schools against one another in a series of underwater challenges.
The prize is a place in the international final in Newfoundland, Canada, later this year.
The Peterhead team emerged victorious in first place after a panel of industry experts rated the teams on how they completed the missions, as well as considering technical reports, poster displays, and engineering presentations.
Peterhead Academy’s team leader Jamie Fenty, taking part for the second time, said: “We’re absolutely ecstatic, it’s the best thing we’ve done. It is going to be so good for the school and hopefully we’ll be able to build on the experience from today when we go forward to the international competition.
“Seeing the ROV in the pool is definitely rewarding and it helps us to learn skills that we can take forward into university or a job.”
Fiona Loudon, technical teacher at Peterhead Academy, added: “All of the team want to pursue engineering as a career, so this is great experience for them as the competition gives them a really good insight into what the industry is like.”
Fellow Aberdeenshire school Mackie Academy claimed third place and Banff Academy were awarded the ‘engineering elegance’ prize.