Objectives were to recover instrumentation on the continental shelf. We planned to recover the instruments on OCEANUS 77 (FA 79035, Dec. 13-20, 1979), but the acoustic releases failed due to a bad set of release batteries. Moorings to be recovered: Station Q (40 30N, 70 13W) recover tripod mooring 178, deploy current mooring 191; Station B (38 44N, 73 38W) recover current mooring 180, recover tripod mooring 177. All instruments were recovered by grappling since releases failed. We planned cross-shelf XBT sections. Sidescan sonar was used to locate the moorings.
Location
Georges Bank, Mid-Atlantic continental shelf, United States, North America, North Atlantic;
Summary
This cruise was conducted in 3 legs: Leg I (Jan. 3-5, 1980), Leg II (Jan. 6-12, 1980), and Leg III (Jan. 20-23). The releases, which failed in Dec. 1979 necessitating this recovery cruise, were checked to determine cause of failure. All 3 releases (Moorings 177, 178, and 180) had receiver batteries manufactured in Feb. 1979 and all failed. Other releases with batteries manufactured in Oct. 1978 and May 1979 were OK. The batteries were returned to Malloy for inspection. Fortunately only 1 VACM was lost (indirectly) due to release failure. In retrospect, were were extremely fortunate to have recovered almost all our equipment given such disastrous release results. Mooring deployed: 1 (#191 recovered FA 80009 OCEANUS 81 May 23 - Jun. 1, 1980). Moorings recovered: 3 (#177 and 178, both deployed FA 79021 OCEANUS 67 Aug. 6-13, 1979; and #180 (VACM 0512 lost), deployed FA 79021 OCEANUS 67 Aug. 6-13, 1979). XBTs: 23; Surface salinity samples: 23.
Info derived
Time series data; Suspended sediment concentrations;
Comments
Original Center People field contained: Brad Butman - Ch. Sci., Legs I, II and III; Barry Irwin - technician, Legs I and II.