Great looking ship!
Posted: November 7, 2014 Filed under: Home | Tags: Future Research Vessel Project, Marine National Facility Leave a commentMax McGuire from the Marine National Facility’s Ships Group has been out taking some gorgeous photos of RV Investigator in port.
Check out the images!
Investigator back in port for a few hours
Posted: November 5, 2014 Filed under: Home | Tags: Marine National Facility, RV Investigator, Scientific sea trials Leave a commentThe new Marine National Facility research vessel, Investigator popped back into port in Hobart on the weekend, to drop off vendors from the first scientific sea trial.
As the ship came into port, Mike Jackson, the MNF’s Project Manager, snapped the ship as the weather started to clear.
Just a few hours later the ship headed back out to sea with a new group of vendors and scientific support staff, who will be testing and calibrating more equipment.
How much does Investigator weigh?
Posted: November 3, 2014 Filed under: Home | Tags: Future Research Vessel Project, Marine National Facility, RV Investigator 1 CommentThe new Marine National Facility research vessel Investigator seems really big, but how much does it weigh?
Turns out it’s a lot!!
There are a couple of key weights we need to measure:
Lightship Displacement – 4343 tonnes
This is the amount of sea water the ship displaces without anything on board, like fuel, water, stores, people, non-permanent scientific equipment. In simple terms, this is what the empty ship would weigh if you put it on a set of scales.
Deadweight – 1550 tonnes
This is the total amount weight that can be carried on the ship, including fuel, water, stores, people, non-permanent scientific equipment etc.
Maximum Displacement – 5893 tonnes (the sum of the two weights above)
This is the maximum weight the ship is allowed to be, for stability and safety reasons.
The other common weight you may see is Gross Tonnage (GT ) – 6082 tonnes. This is a volumetric measurement in cubic metres of all internal spaces within the ship and is used for registration and revenue purposes, in particular port related charges. This was known as Gross Registered Tonnage (GRT).
At lightship displacement the ship’s draft is 5.1 metres and at maximum displacement the draft is 6.2 metres. The draft is measured from the deepest part of the keel (bottom) of the ship and the gondola sits 1.2 metres below the keel.
Investigator departs on its first scientific sea trial!
Posted: October 28, 2014 Filed under: Home | Tags: Australia's Marine National Facility, Future Research Vessel Project, RV Investigator Leave a commentEarly this morning the new Marine National Facility research vessel Investigator departed the CSIRO wharf in Hobart, on its first scientific sea trial.
Check out the photos!
Welcome to Port Celebrations in just two weeks!
Posted: October 27, 2014 Filed under: Home | Tags: Marine National Facility, RV Investigator, Welcome to Port Celebrations Leave a commentOn Friday 12 December, we’ll be hosting Welcome to Port Celebrations for RV Investigator at the CSIRO Laboratories at Battery Point in Hobart and we’d love all of you to come!
In the morning will be a formal function for invited guests, and then in the afternoon from 3-8pm we’ll be throwing open the doors of CSIRO so you can come and look at RV Investigator, the new Marine National Facility research vessel.
There’s so much happening on the day, we could barely squeeze it into our poster!
If you can’t read all of the detail, you can download the .
Investigator’s scientific sea trials are about to begin!
Posted: October 27, 2014 Filed under: Home | Tags: Marine National Facility, RV Investigator, Scientific sea trials 1 CommentSince Investigator arrived in Hobart in early September we’ve been really busy fitting out $6.7 million worth of scientific equipment, from one end of the ship to the other.
Now it’s time to go out for scientific sea trials on the new Marine National Facility research vessel, Investigator, to check all of the gear works to its optimum capacity and to also get some training on how to operate the scientific equipment from the manufacturers.
There are some really cool bits of gear that we’ll be testing on the first voyage, including the sonar that maps the sea floor, the TRIAXUS, the radon detector and the gravity meter.
The ship is scheduled to be back in port in Hobart on 1 November, when we’re going to do a fast turn around, and head back out to sea on the same day, with a whole new group of vendors.
On the second sea trial we’ll be testing and calibrating the research trawling capability, deep water sea floor core sampling, and more sonar like the sub-bottom profiler, which is able to collect data up to 100 metres into the sea bed.
Welcome to Port Celebrations for RV Investigator!
Posted: October 17, 2014 Filed under: Home | Tags: Australia's Marine National Facility, Future Research Vessel Project, Marine National Facility Leave a comment
We are pleased to advise that a date has been set for the official Welcome to Port Celebrations on Friday 12 December 2014 for the new Marine National Facility research vessel, Investigator.
The day will be a celebration of the collaboration, foresight and hard work invested by Australia’s marine science community over the past decade, and in particular CSIRO’s management of the Future Research Vessel Project, which culminated in the delivery of the world class research vessel to its home port of Hobart just a few weeks ago.
At the event the ship will formally be handed over from the CSIRO’s Future Research Vessel Project to the Marine National Facility, for use as Australia’s ocean going national research vessel.
The event will be held at the CSIRO Marine Laboratories in Hobart, where a formal function will be held, followed by an open day for the general public. Further details for these events will be sent in the coming weeks.
We welcome everyone to be part of this celebration, but if you can’t make it in person you can join via social media and online through the Investigator@CSIRO blog, all of which will be updated with photos and videos across the day.
We look forward to seeing you at the celebrations.
Toni Moate
Executive Director, Future Research Vessel Project
