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Research Voyages

MAPPING SEABED HABITATS OFF wEST AUSTRALIA SS07/05 Jul 05

[Introduction] [The Voyage] [The Voyagers] [Ship to shore]

Ship to shore

Day 23 - Looking under the Ocean
by Mark Lewis

A picture of the small ledge and then ...

... the close up of the rock.

The camera system on deck with two strobes and a straight frame

Repaired camera with one strobe and a streamlined tow bridle.

I am here as part of the 'camera team' with special responsibilities of looking after the mechanics of the winch we use and the camera system. The winch is a self contained, transportable unit that only requires a three phase power outlet to run. The winch contains three thousand two hundred metres of 16mm optic fiber double armoured cable and can be driven from one of the two electronic remote control joysticks.

The camera system we use can be deployed to depths of over two thousand metres, records video footage in stereo and has an 8 mega pixel digital stills camera. We record the footage at the surface and down-load the camera via the cable when required.

The camera system has so far recorded 39 hours of footage of seafloor never before seen by anyone. We have 34 CDs of photos of the seafloor including the wonderful creatures that live there. Sadly we also have footage of a rock face after a close encounter yesterday that nearly claimed the camera.

It was an exciting moment when we were traversing the sea-floor 700 metres down when out of the gloom a large rock appeared. The cry of "winch up, WINCH UP" was heard from the co-pilot watching the look-ahead camera and the winch driver wound up as fast as he could.

Luckily we rose over that rock to reveal gently undulating seafloor with low current generated sand waves. This soon gave way to a rather pretty small ledge being used by several life forms (sponges, crinoids and some fish) as an anchor to allow them to feed in the current. This was only to lull us into a false sense of security as a few minutes later the familiar cry of "winch up, WINCH UP" was heard from the co-pilot. This time the seafloor had a few more surprises for us and the camera system crashed into the rock and stayed there for what seemed a very long time.

The camera team jumped into action with one going to the back deck to monitor the winch tension and wire angles, one kept retrieving slowly maintaining tension on the wire and the other communicated with the bridge to help maintain the vessel in the best position for retrieval
whilst monitoring any signals from the camera system.

Due to the flexibility of the winch and the quick response of the team the system was recovered with only minimal damage (one strobe lost and a couple of blown globes, a bent tail fin and structural damage to the protective frame and tow arm). After 5 hours of intensive repairs, assisted by the ships engineers, the system was back up and running.

A picture of the small ledge and then the close up of the rock. This was a great relief as the images are essential to this work and will greatly assist in planning for the next voyage. Physical sampling of the organisms seen on the seafloor during this voyage will be carried out on our next voyage later this year. The pictures will help as we do not even know what type of organism some of them are and by supplying the experts at the museums with an image they will be better prepared for the next chapter in this voyage of discovery.

At sea you have to work as a team as there are many duties that need to be undertaken to make any voyage successful. You may find me helping to deploy all types of equipment, driving the camera system, backing up photos, taking syringe cores of sediment out of the grab, sorting through the sediment for very small organisms, carrying preservative down from the store and mixing them in the preservation laboratory, sampling water from the CTD or nursing the swath mapper and TOPAS systems. This along with any repairs and maintenance keep me busy during the voyage.

I enjoy the sense of being part of a team that works together using each others strengths to get the jobs done and gathers the samples that enable us to better understand this fascinating part of the world.

more about Mark Lewis
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Updated: 29/03/07