Science onboard RV Investigator is going atmospheric!
Posted: October 31, 2013 Filed under: Home | Tags: Atmospheric, Atmospheric research, Australia's Marine National Facility, Future Research Vessel Project, Group 2 scientific equipment, Nephelometer, RV Investigator, ship construction Leave a commentOne of the new and exciting capabilities for Australia’s Marine National Facility is in the scientific discipline of atmospheric research.
There are two dedicated atmospheric laboratories onboard RV Investigator, and a suite of instrumentation that will passively, continuously, collect data wherever the vessel goes.
Part of this suite of instruments is the nephelometer.
The what?
It’s a tricky name, nephelometer, which comes from the Greek word for cloud, nephos.
It uses light beams to tell us about the particles in the atmosphere – it can tell us how clean the air is.
Did you know that light coming from the sun can actually be deflected by the particles suspended in our atmosphere? That’s why when it’s a hazy day you can’t see very far.
The nephelometer can tell us how much light from the sun is making it through the atmosphere and how much is being reflected back into space!
The nephelometer that will be used onboard RV Investigator has been delivered to Jason Ward (below), from the Atmosphere and Land Observation and Assessment section of CSIRO Marine and Atmospheric Research.
Seriously cool scientific equipment for RV Investigator!
Posted: October 29, 2013 Filed under: Home | Tags: Australia's Marine National Facility, Future Research Vessel Project, Phytoplankton, Plankton, RV Investigator, Triaxus 2 CommentsWe’re purchasing some pretty incredible scientific equipment to be fitted to RV Investigator and there will also be some other items, which can be loaded onto the ship, depending on the voyage and the science to be undertaken.
One of the amazing (and seriously cool) pieces of equipment is the TRIAXUS – it even has an awesome name! 
This is state-of-the-art technology made from carbon fibre, is hydrodynamically designed to be towed up to 3km behind the ship and to collect data quickly, while flying from the surface down to 350m in an undisturbed marine environment.
The scientists onboard RV Investigator are able to control the flight path to develop a 2D picture of the ocean.
The TRIAXUS can be fitted with different types of instruments such as temperature, salinity and oxygen sensors, instruments to count and identify plankton, and equipment to estimate the amount of phytoplankton.
All of this information is sent to the scientists onboard via a fibre optic cable in real-time.
So what will the data the scientist receive look like?
It arrives onboard as bleeps and blops, and is converted to incredible, colourful snapshots of the ocean like those below. So let’s explain the first image – this shows us the temperature of the ocean down to 160m, with dark blue indicating the temperate is 18.5 degrees Celsius.
The second image tells us how salty the water is, with high concentrations indicated by red. This data helps us track where currents go, at different depths.
The third image shows us fluorescence – now this is really cool!
Phytoplankton, are the small building blocks of life in the oceans, when you shine a light on them, they are able to emit a different coloured light as a reaction. We need this data to work out where fish and other animals in the ocean start their lives and where their food sources can be found. When you look at this image the red, orange and yellow colours show a higher concentration of phytoplankton.
The last image shows us the amount of oxygen in the water with red indicating the greater amounts of oxygen.
Decommissioning RV Southern Surveyor
Posted: October 23, 2013 Filed under: Home | Tags: Australia's Marine National Facility, Southern Surveyor Leave a commentWe’ve got a few weeks before prospective buyers can take a tour of the current Marine National Facility research vessel, Southern Surveyor, and so in that time we need to decommission the ship.
This week hydrochemistry support staff from CSIRO, Alicia Navidad and Mark Rayner, are onboard removing equipment from the laboratory.
Southern Surveyor ties up in Hobart for the last time!
Posted: October 17, 2013 Filed under: Home | Tags: Australia's Marine National Facility, Southern Ocean, Southern Surveyor 2 CommentsSouthern Surveyor pulled into port this morning in Hobart, after its final research voyage.
Conditions in the Southern Ocean were a little uncomfortable for the crew, support staff and scientists, with 10 metre waves making the voyage interesting for a few days.
This ship was tied up for the last time and the final group of scientists has packed up their personal items to disembark.
The scientific equipment will be demobilised from Southern Surveyor, and then that will be end of service for the ship, as the Marine National Facility research vessel.
It’s a bit of a sad day for people who’ve worked onboard this ship, which has served Australia’s marine scientists for so many years, and CSIRO researchers before that.
Haunting photos of the shipwreck of MV Limerick
Posted: October 16, 2013 Filed under: Home | Tags: Australia's Marine National Facility, Limerick, Southern Surveyor, WW2 shipwreck 2 CommentsEarlier this year one of Australia’s wartime mysteries was solved, when the team onboard Australia’s Marine National Facility research vessel, Southern Surveyor, discovered and mapped the wreckage of the MV Limerick, off the coast of Ballina in northern NSW.
The MV Limerick was sunk in 1943, and it has taken almost 70 years, and the opportunistic use of Australia’s Marine National Facility research vessel, Southern Surveyor, to identify the ship’s final location.
Limerick was one of the largest vessels sunk by Japanese submarines off Australia’s east coast from 1942 to 1943.
Confirming the wreck as MV Limerick was in the national interest. We were already in the area, we had the necessary technology and technical expertise and in the end it didn’t take long to create a 3-D image of the wreck.
Now, a diver has plunged the 107 metres at the shipwreck site and captured the first haunting images.
You can read all about Damien Siviero’s dive here.
HMAS Australia survey shows wreck in 3-D for the first time!
Posted: October 14, 2013 Filed under: Home | Tags: Australia's Marine National Facility, HMAS Australia, NSW Office of Environment and Heritage, Southern Surveyor Leave a comment
THIS MEDIA RELEASE WAS DISTRIBUTED BY THE NSW OFFICE OF ENVIRONMENT AND HERITAGE ON 10 OCTOBER 2013.
Sophisticated multi-beam sonar technology has been used to create up-to-date images of the shipwreck of HMAS Australia, once the flagship of the Royal Australian Naval Fleet, Director of Heritage Division at NSW Office of Environment and Heritage (OEH) Tracey Avery announced today.
Ms Avery said the images were captured on board Australia’s Marine National Facility research vessel, Southern Surveyor off Sydney Heads, close to the location where the ship was scuttled in 1924.
“HMAS Australia was launched in 1911 and commissioned as the flagship of the Royal Australian Navy (RAN) in 1913,” Ms Avery said.
“The ship led the fledgling fleet into Sydney Harbour on 4 October 1913, at the end of its delivery voyage from England, along with six other vessels and it is this event the International Fleet Review has been commemorating (3-11 October 2013).
“This highly significant vessel was Australia’s only battlecruiser, and it is considered the ‘grandmother’ of the RAN and was instrumental in preventing German aggression in the South Pacific during World War I.
“The arrival of the flagship HMAS Australia and the newly formed Royal Australian Navy in 1913 was highly significant, as it symbolised Australia’s coming of age as a nation that could protect itself with its own Navy, and the end of the reliance on British protection.
“Amid great controversy, the British agreed to decommission the vessel under the terms of the Washington Treaty (1922), and HMAS Australia was scuttled with full military honours, a move that was designed to limit the spread of a naval arms race in the Pacific region.”
Although a previous video inspection of sections of the site was undertaken in 2007 by the RAN, a complete and detailed survey of the extent of the wreck site has never before been undertaken.
OEH was provided with research time on board Southern Surveyor, to locate and capture the first 3-D images of the shipwreck, which sits in 390 metres of water, and was discovered in 1990 during a commercial survey.
The Australian Marine National Facility is funded by the Commonwealth and operated by CSIRO. The survey vessel is available to all Australian scientists and their international collaborators.
OEH Maritime Archaeologist Brad Duncan said research time was obtained aboard the Southern Surveyor during a September transit voyage from Brisbane to Hobart.
“The multi-beam imaging carried out on-board, provides more comprehensive images of the wreck than were previously available and they build on previous research in 2007, when a video inspection of the site was carried out,” Mr Duncan said.
“As HMAS Australia sank, loose items fell off (including gun turrets); and the wreck caused an underwater landslide when it collided with the seabed, which spread wreckage over a vast area.
“The images confirm the shipwreck came to rest upside down on a gentle slope, it is laying North-west–South-east and it has a slight list, with the bow to the surface. There is also evidence of a debris field around the hull.
“This survey, which shows the vessel has not degraded significantly since it was first located, will add significantly to our understanding of how the wreck site was formed.”
The HMAS Australia is listed as a protected historic shipwreck on the Australian National Shipwreck Database, and is managed by the Office of Environment and Heritage under delegation from the Commonwealth government.
Further details of previous inspections can be found at:
http://www.environment.nsw.gov.au/MaritimeHeritage/whatsnew/index.htm#hmasaustraliashipwreckreport
Container-ing your excitement!
Posted: October 10, 2013 Filed under: Home | Tags: Australia's Marine National Facility, container laboratory, coring system, Future Research Vessel Project, RV Investigator, ship construction, shipping container Leave a commentAustralia’s new Marine National Facility research vessel, Investigator, has a system onboard which permits us to add up to 13 container laboratories.
It doesn’t sound exciting does it? But you are so wrong!
This is a fantastic design feature, which is like being able to take an extra suitcase onboard, but instead of shoes and clothes, it will have specialist equipment and scientific capabilities!
This means that scientists from around Australia, and their international collaborators, can pack their container, ship it to the departure port, and then load it onto Investigator without having to unpack.
See, it’s seriously cool!
There are places on the deck and in the hold under the main deck (aft), for these container laboratories.
Here are some photos of the fabulous design for the containers, the seafloor coring system container laboratory, and the transfer trolley onboard RV Investigator that will allow us to move containers into the hold.
