OCS Study MMS 95 - Data Center

esilient in the face of petroleum-related activities .In this regard, our overall goal isto determine to what extent the Gulf of Mexico deep water petroleum seeps fit intotwo possible categories : a robust or fragile community .Determination of the extent to which the hydrocarbon seep communities arerobust or fragile entails coordinated geological, geochemical, and ecological researchefforts that will develop an understanding of the spatial and temporal linkage patternbetween hydrocarbon seepage and the formation of chemosynthetic communitydevelopment on the seafloor .These investigations must determine how communitiesare established and persist within the particular geological and geochemicalenvironments that support them .As stated above, the key to understandingpotential impacts lies in understanding how the processes of geology, geochemistry,and biology interact.1 .2 Summary of Study AccomplishmentsThe Study was initiated on 26 July 1991 . The Principal Investigators (PIs)made substantial resources available to the Study at no cost to MMS . Theseresources included a large and diverse amount of data gathered during previousinvestigations of chemosynthetic ecosystems in the Gulf of Mexico . Additionally, theNorth Carolina National Oceanographic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA)National Undersea Research Center had granted the PIs a series of submarine diveswith the Johnson Sea-Link during 1991 and 1992 . Consequently, the PIs were able tooffer MMS a research program that was more extensive and which commenced fieldactivities more expeditiously than anticipated in the Request for Proposal (RFP) .The first submarine cruise (JSL-91) on this project utilized the Johnson Sea-Link I, deployed from the support ship RN Seward Johnson during 25, 26, and 31August and 14-27 September 1991 . The cruise occupied locations of knownchemosynthetic communities in water depths of 500 to 750 m (Figure 2 .1) .1-3