News & Events
June 2010
The mooring has been deployed at the PAP site by the scientists and crew on-board the RRS James Clark Ross, but as reported below by Johannes Karstensen the lander may have been lost:
The final MODOO lander system deployment took place on the 1. June 01:00.
Although successfully ranged and triangulated in the following hours a second ranging on the 2. June failed. Further ranging of the lander from different distances failed. Assuming that it may be at drift subsurface the release commands have been send several times. No visual (flasher) sign nor Argos message has been received so far - so it is very unlikely that the lander is at surface.
One element that has been on the lander to document the landing at the sea floor, a DropCam from a National Geographic team that is here on board, was recovered on the 2. June later afternoon. The DropCam glass sphere, made for 13.000dbar, was in a very bad shape with cracks and glass chips all over, most electronics were destroyed. Given the condition of the DropCam sphere it seems very likely that the buoyancy glass spheres on the lander have imploded and destroyed other spheres as well as the release units.
The instrumentation that is on the lander (NIOZ) comprises:
1) CT - NIOZ
2) ADCP - NIOZ
3) Wetlabs FLNTURTD - NIOZ
4) Argos beacon - NIOZ
5) 2 Benthos Release units - NIOZ
6) Sediment trap - NIOZ
7) Bottom pressure sensor - NOC,L
8) Seismic unit - IFM-GEOMAR
9) Lander Modem - IFM-GEOMAR
10) Passive acoustic device - University Aberdeen
All possible actions we could think of have been taken to locate the lander - but without success. I am very sorry for all of us that this happened. In particular for NIOZ this is a major loss of equipment. The NIOZ team Henko de Stigter and John Cluderay did an enormous job here on board to make sure that the mission will be a success.
However, some of the MODOO goals could be demonstrated during the
cruise: the online transmission worked during a first test deployment that lasted about 20 hours, the Modem data logger worked as expected for most instrumentation.
A more detailed document will follow for your information and for further discussions.
Best wishes
Johannes
January 2010
MODOO has lodged the 6th month project status report with ESONET. The project is well on track to success and Johannes Karstensson the project co-ordinator produced the following update on 19th January.
HARDWARE:
In the past few month quiet a bit of work has gone into the technical realization of MODOO. In close collaboration with Develogic, the manufacturer of the acoustic modems, most instrumentation that will be connected to the lander modem, has been provisionally tested.
This includes:
1) CTD + Backscatter
2) ADCP (2 way, re-programmable for water profiling as well as burst
sampling)
3) Seismometer (2 way, retrieval of selected time period - 1 Minute - in the past e.g. seismic event)
4) Sediment trap (2 way, re-programmable for change sampling interval)
While
5) Optode
6) Camera - not implemented yet but ideas exists on how this can work will be soon.
Develogic is preparing for a bench test at the moment to have all devices being connected and working.
After a successful test on the bench all devices will be shipped to NIOZ, to be mounted on the lander and put into a tank for a "wet test"
that is planned to last until Mid April.
This "wet test" is crucial - not only the real time instrumentation but ALL lander instrumentation is required to be shipped to NIOZ for this.
The tests shall also include a the acoustic + inductive gateway on which NOCS and Develogics are working at the moment. This may even work in a mode that simulates the deployment as such that Maureen will receive "real-time data" in the same manner as she can expect during the deployment.
The wet test event might be also a good opportunity to have a another MODOO/MODOO connect meeting - say on the 15. - 16. April?
It would be great if Jerome and Julian from IFREMER can also attend ...
CRUISE:
After the NIOZ tests everything is shipped to Tenerife/Lisbon for the James Clark Ross cruise and the MODOO deployment at PAP! The cruise dates/port calls are not yet 100% set - but so far it looks like it will be around 20th of May.
The recovery cruise on Celtic Explorer in September this year is provisionally accepted.
The MODOO kickoff meeting was held at NOCS on the 7-8 May 2009.