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of a nodule-strewn plain, picking up the nodules and burying them in its
tracks. The aim was to recreate on a smaller scale – limited to a circular
area of 11 square kilometres -- some of the impact that might be expected
from a full-fledged mining vehicle.
Among the findings were that the fauna in the miner’s path were
likely to be destroyed and animals inhabiting the nodules themselves would
be obliterated until new nodules reformed naturally at the rate of a few
millimetres per million years. Many sediment dwellers were likely to
recolonise from surrounding areas, but the researchers had found smaller
populations of many species in the disturbed areas as much as seven years
after the initial impact.
Explaining that DISCOL had terminated before all of the impacts
could be thoroughly studied, Dr. Schriever advanced suggestions for a
further project, which he hoped could be organized by international
cooperation. This would involve disturbance of a larger area by a device
more like those that would eventually be used for commercial mining. He
stated that no study so far had operated on a scale large enough to gauge
what would happen during mining.
Schriever’s suggestion that a full study might take up to 12 years
provoked comment. Speakers urged the international community to start
such a project now, while enough time remained before the start of
commercial mining. Another suggestion was that controlled experiments
could yield valuable information about animal response to different levels of
resedimentation.
Varying views were expressed about the likely extent of animal
depopulation and the length of time needed for recovery. Some speakers
pointed out that few animals could survive direct contact with a mining
device that would range over many square kilometres of nodule-bearing
surface. It was also noted that much of the area around a mine site would
be made barren by burial beneath the sediment plume kicked up by mining
activity. Others, noting that the rough bottom topography would leave many
areas unmineable, said that such undisturbed places could be a reservoir
for recolonising animals. A recurring question, unanswered by DISCOL, was
this: If the fauna had not fully recovered seven years after a small
disturbance, how long would the effects from full-scale mining endure?
Dr. P. John D. Lambshead, head of the Nematode Research Group
at the Natural History Museum, London, dealt with meiofauna, particularly
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