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Showing posts from May, 2014

Marine Mapping Midpoint and Venus

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Halfway through the R/V Falkor expedition to map the Papahānaumokuākea Marine National Monument, we have traveled nearly 4000 km and mapped many areas, including the Rogatien Ridge and the Gardner Pinnacles . Along the way, we have to take turns keeping watch for whales and diverting the ship away from them if necessary in order to maintain a safe distance due to the ship's active sonar. My turn taking watch is usually the hour before and after dinner out on the ship's upper deck , which means I get to witness many spectacular sunsets and moonrises. My colleagues on the sunrise whale watches have remarked at how bright Venus can be. This got me thinking about just how similar mapping the seafloor is to mapping the surface of Venus. Can you tell which of the two pictures below is from Earth's seafloor and which is from Venus? Both are backscatter images. One is produced by radar and the other by sonar, but the principle is the same. You send a pulse of ener

The magnetic personalities of seamounts

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The Papahānaumokuākea Marine National Monument encompasses a vast area larger than all U.S. national parks combined. As I mentioned last time , We came here on the R/V Falkor to map the seafloor around the islands, atolls, reefs, and seamounts that comprise the Northwestern Hawaiian Island chain within the monument. Ultimately, we want to gain a better understanding of the geological processes that helped shape this part of the world. As the ship cruises along at around 10 knots, we operate three different data collection systems. First, we have a multibeam sonar that pings the seafloor with sound to give us a picture of what the ocean bottom looks like. Then, we have a gravimeter , which detects minute gravity variations that tell us what is beneath the seafloor surface. Finally, our magnetometer measures the Earth’s magnetic field along our path and provides information on the relative ages of seafloor features. On this cruise, we are using a Geometrics G-882 magnetometer p

Falkor's Neverending Story

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What if we could explore far off corners of the world just like the famous luck dragon Falkor in the classic book and movie The Neverending Story ? The Schmidt Ocean Institute launched the R/V Falkor to do just that. Funded by Google's deep pockets, this private research ship is charged with exploring uncharted depths of the sea and offers scientists competitive opportunities to conduct their own research expeditions along the way. Since we know more about the surface of the Moon and Mars than we do our own ocean , this is a very timely mission. All data collected on the Falkor is made freely available to the public in order to best advance knowledge about the regions it explores. I have had the good fortune to take part in two cruises aboard the Falkor. Last month, I participated in a short 3-day training cruise to the Maui Nui area, and now I am one week into a 36-day cruise to map the Papahānaumokuākea Marine National Monument (PMNM) (aka: Northwestern Hawaii