Program Update – August 2013
A University of Washington team of engineers and scientists in August concluded the VISIONS ’13 expedition this month completing critical at sea work to allow for future instrument installation on the cabled observatory component of the Ocean Observatories Initiative (OOI) program.
The goal of the six-week cruise was to complete work on the OOI cable component in preparation for 2014 installation of secondary nodes and junction boxes, instruments and mooring profilers at five study sites in the northeast Pacific Ocean. When fully operational in 2015, each of these sites will feature real-time, two-way communication to the Internet and power provided by 550 miles of electo-optical telecommunications cable installed in 2011 and seven primary nodes deployed in 2012.
During the expedition, which took place in July and August, the UW team successfully installed and tested 22,000 meters of extension cables and four instrument subnets. Those are in place to be connected to the primary infrastructure of the cabled observatory. Among many expedition accomplishments, the UW team tested and verified function of three medium power junction boxes, four short period seismometers, a high definition video camera, 3D thermistor array, bottom pressure tilt sensor, two pressure sensors, two benthic flow meters and two caissons. All equipment was tested and found to be functional. Click here to read more about the Visions ’13 Expedition Highlights.
The team also detected earthquakes during testing of both the ASHES and Eastern Caldera subnets and provided streaming live video during the events. Click HERE to view a video feed from the Visions 13 cruise. The OOI regional cabled observatory, often referred to as the OOI’s Regional Scales Node (RSN), is the first United States regional cabled observatory.
In other news, the OOI Program has recently updated the Opportunities Section of the OOI Website. Visitors to this section can view the latest news on OOI opportunities including Requests for Proposals, an Introduction on the program procurement process and information on OOI vendors and contract awards.
In other news, the OOI team continues to monitor equipment deployed in July as part of the first global site of the OOI infrastructure at the Station Papa location in the Gulf of Alaska.
A team led by the Scripps Institution of Oceanography at UC San Diego, with their partners at the Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution, conducted a cruise deploying that equipment on July 15-29. During the cruise, the OOI team deployed one Global Hybrid Profiler Mooring, two Mesoscale Flanking Moorings and three Global Gliders. A total of 57 instruments were deployed. The OOI team now is in the process of monitoring the instruments and gaining experience with their remote use and operation, and will make more information available when possible on the OOI Website. Click Here to Submit a Question or Leave a Comment about the OOI.
