RV Investigator to undertake maiden voyage

The Australian scientific research vessel Investigator, which was commissioned into service in December 2014, will this week embark on its maiden research voyage.

The vessel will journey into the Southern Ocean, described by Minister for Industry and Science Ian Macfarlane as “a focal point for global research into fisheries, weather and climate”. There, it will deploy a series of marine monitoring moorings that will remain in the ocean for over a year and will return data live via satellite.

“The primary objective of the voyage is for scientists to redeploy the Integrated Marine Observing System’s Southern Ocean Time Series moorings,” Macfarlane said. “These are critical to our understanding of the role of the Southern Ocean in transferring heat and carbon dioxide between the atmosphere and ocean.

“The voyage will map the ocean’s physical, chemical and biological properties in the area around the moorings using a TRIAXUS towed sensor. This will enable the relationship between the atmosphere and the ocean to be better understood. In parallel, scientists will also map ocean ecosystems using a state-of-the-art, bio-acoustics fish finding sonar.”

The maiden voyage is a collaboration between CSIRO, the Antarctic Climate and Ecosystems Cooperative Research Centre, the Integrated Marine Observing System, the Australian Bureau of Meteorology and the University of Tasmania’s Institute for Marine and Antarctic Studies. Scientists from Monash University, Swinburne University of Technology and the University of New South Wales will additionally be undertaking separate and complementary research.

“The new vessel is a critical platform to collect data that informs government and industry decision-making across a range of disciplines including fisheries management, geological resources and marine operations,” Macfarlane said.

A full list of voyages for the next three years is available at http://www.mnf.csiro.au/Voyages/Investigator-schedules.aspx.

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