VISIONS'15 Instruments
The 35-day Cabled Array VISIONS’15 cruise onboard the R/V Thompson using the CSSF remotely operated vehicle ROPOS (for the first Operations and Maintenance cruise for the National Science Foundation’s Ocean Observatories Initiative) was highly successfu. A total number of cabled instruments now sending live data back from the ocean is 130!
During this cruise,
3 instrumented shallow winched profilers, each hosting two instrumented platforms were recovered and reinstalled with a total of 51 instruments;
3 deep profiler moorings were installed, each hosting an instrumented Mclane wire crawler (one now recovered);
2 instrumented low-power junction boxes, each hosting 6 instruments were recovered and reinstalled; and
2 Benthic Experiment Platforms were recovered and reinstalled.
In total, ROPOS completed 55 dives over the 35 day cruise with almost no downtime.
CTD - Conductivity-Temperatu
A CTD is an instrument used to determine how conductivity (C) and temperature (T) measurements in the ocean vary relative to depth (D) and is a primary tool for measuring physical properties of the ocean. Salinity is determined from electr ...
Dissolved Oxygen Sensor V15
Dissolved oxygen is the most well-known gas in ocean waters, because several types of sensors are commercially available. These include membrane Clark-type cells and optode sensors. The OOI program uses both types of oxygen sensors o ...
Benthic Experiment Package V
The Benthic Experiment Package (BEP) is composed of a hazard-resistant frame, the inside of which hosts an UW-APL-designed Low Power communications housing, and a variety of sensors to measure oceanographic properties that include acidity (pH), ...
Acoustic Doppler Current Pro
An Acoustic Doppler Current Profiler (ADCP) provides a 3D water-current velocity for a small volume of the overlying water column by making very high-frequency acoustic (75- to 600-kHz) doppler shift measurements. These instruments ar ...
Seafloor Pressure Sensor V15
Real-time measurements provided by seafloor pressure sensors are of great importance because lunar tides, storms, and tsunamis strongly impact pressures at the seafloor and the flow of fluids into and out of the oceanic crust. In 2014 ...
Benthic Flow Meter V15
The benthic flow meter measures the velocity of fluids flowing into and out of the seafloor at methane seep sites, which is critical to determining the amount (flux) of methane, hydrogen sulfide, and other gases that are emitted into the overlyi ...
Optical Attenuation Sensor V
Optical absorption and attenuation instruments allows total scattering to be derived for living and detrital particles in the ocean. This model is the WET Labs AC-S instrument. During VISIONS '14, optical attenua ...
Horizontal Electrometer Pres
The Horizontal Electrometer-Pressure-Inverted Echosounder (HPIES) is an instrument that utilizes a bottom pressure sensor, a 12-kHz inverted echosounder and a horizontal electrometer to measure the horizontal electrical field, the bottom pressur ...
Low Frequency Hydrophone V15
Part of this detection and monitoring of seismic events will be provided by low-frequency hydrophones (2 Hz to 20 KHz) that are well suited to detect the hydroacoustic tertiary phase of T waves of oceanic earthquakes. These sensors also de ...
Broadband Hydrophone V15
The high-frequency broadband hydrophone may be used to hear noises from oceanic creatures as well as human sources. During VISIONS 14, broadband hydrophones were installed at the Endurance offshore benthic package (LJ01C), nearshore b ...
Turbulent Flow Current Meter
A current meter (tripod with red legs) measures local currents and temperature. When deployed in conjunction with a nearby broadband seismometer, current meters can provide important data for processing of seismic information. Local currents can ...
Osmotic Sampler V15
Osmotic samplers draw hydrothermal fluids into small capillary-like tubing and allow long-term sampling of diffuse and black smoker hydrothermal fluids, as well as fluids from methane seeps. Osmo samplers were installed in 2014 at the ...
Thermistor Array V15
A custom thermistor array, developed by UW RSN Project Scientist, Giora Proskurowski, measures the 3-dimensional distribution of temperatures within a diffuse flow site. In 2014, a cabled version of the thermistor ar ...
Resistivity Probe V15
Known as the "Res Probe," this novel seafloor instrument is designed to go inside the "throats" of high temperature (up to 480°C) black smoker chimneys to measure the resistivity and temperature of the hydrothermal vent f ...
Bottom Pressure and Tilt Met
The Bottom Pressure and Tilt Meter (BOPT) is a custom instrument developed by Bill Chadwick at NOAA PMEL in Newport, Oregon The BOPT measures the inflation and deflation of the seafloor at the summit of Axial Seamount using a precision pressure ...
Remote Access Fluid and DNA
The RAS (Remote Access Sampler) allows time-series temperature measurement in real-time and in situ sampling of hydrothermal vent fluids, while the PPS (Phytoplankton Sampler) allows filtering and preservation of microbial DNA. Thanks to two-way ...
Mass Spectrometer V15
Measurements of dissolved gas concentrations such as carbon dioxide, methane, and hydrogen sulfide are critical to understanding volcanic, chemical, and biological processes in submarine environments. Carbon dioxide in magma chambers helps drive ...
High Definition Video Camera
The high-definition video camera on the OOI RSN cabled system will obtain high resolution views of black smoker fluids and coupled biological activity at the Mushroom hydrothermal sulfide chimney within the ASHES hydrothermal field on the wester ...
Digital Still Camera V15
Only very rarely has there ever been long-term (~1-year) imagery taken of methane seep and hydrothermal vent sites, yet the information digital stills provide is crucial to understanding how these venting systems evolve and their linkages to bio ...
Shortperiod Ocean Bottom Sei
Short-period ocean-bottom seismometers (OBSSP) detect vibrations from small earthquakes ranging from 0.1 Hz to 100 Hz. These earthquakes are caused by local phenomena, such as melt movement beneath Axial Seamount and upward flow of hydroth ...
Broadband Seismometers V15
Broadband seismometers measure seismicity/earthquake activity along tectonic plate boundaries where key phenomena can occur: large-magnitude subduction zone earthquakes, localize earthquakes associated with faulting and spreading events, and sei ...
