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National News
Figure 1: New AUV for German ridge studies.
Other major activities include the delivery of the 6000-m capable
AUV for ridge studies by the company Hydroid LLC
of Massachusetts, USA (Fig. 1). The vehicle is presently undergoing
seatrials before being put into action at Logatchev in
January 2009. Fig. 1 shows the vehicle aboard R/V Poseidon
during these trials. The vehicle can be operated in three different
configurations, either with a Reson 7125D multibeam,
a black and white camera and flash, or a sub-bottom profiler.
Common to all configurations is an Edgetech 2200 side-scan
sonar, a Seabird CTD, an Ecotech backscattering detector, and
an Eh sensor, the latter kindly provided by Koichi Nakamura
of AIST, Japan. On the research front, the German Ridge community
is initiating a proposal to G-cubed for a thematic issue
on slow-spreading ridges. Colin Devey, Nadine Le Bris, Nicole
Dubilier, Jian Lin and Doug Connelly will be put forward as
guest editors.
India
K.A. Kamesh Raju
Recent cruise onboard R/V Sonne to the Carlsberg
Ridge and the Andaman Sea
The NIO-RVS2 cruise from 17 Oct. - 1 Dec. 2007 was conducted
as the second phase field program of the CSIR (India)
- Network Program, “Tectonic and oceanic processes along the
Indian ridge system and the back arc basins.” The main objective
of the cruise was to acquire multiparameter
data together with deep-tow and seafloor imaging
over segments of the Carlsberg Ridge (CR) and the
Andaman Backarc Spreading Center (ABSC; Fig.
1). The cruise was conducted onboard the German
research vessel R/V Sonne (Fig. 2) chartered by the
National Institute of Oceanography (NIO). We also
collaborated with the Hawaii Mapping Research
Group (HMRG), University of Hawaii, and hired
equipment (MAPRs) from PMEL, NOAA (USA).
Observations included multibeam mapping, magnetics,
deep-tow surveys along the rift valley, ocean
floor imaging with OFOS (Ocean Floor Observing
System, Fig. 3) at selected locations, and seabed sampling using
a TV-guided-grab (Fig. 4), dredge, spade core and gravity core.
Water column sampling, CTD and MAPR observations were
also carried out over the CR and ABSC segments.
Figure 1: Cruise track.
InterRidge News 34 Vol. 17, 2008