MAS3-CT97-0101

Back to SEISCAN

The project SEISCAN began on the 1^st October 1997 for 3 years. In fact it will actually end on 31^st December 2000. It is a project to rescue information; a data capture exercise in the traditional language of archiving. The origins of the project are relatively well chronicled. In 1995 I was tracking down seismic records from the deep-water North Atlantic region for a research project. It became increasingly difficult to locate the seismic records from early surveys, nor indeed to find any reproduced form of many of them. The United States had for many years catalogued, and even published, photographic images of early survey records, and that was where the trail led.

The National Geophysical Data Centre (NGDC) at Boulder, Colorado held the original photographic prints of the Lamont-Doherty Geological Observatory seismic sections (Talwani et al., 1974). They provided every assistance to me in completing the objectives with the data available. NGDC had however now decided that the photographic archive was not practical or conducive to the way the centre was moving in IT information archive. In deciding to scan the seismic data NGDC discovered that the original records, for which they were not responsible, no longer existed or could not be located. It became apparent that for a wide variety of reasons some other centres could not locate all their old original seismic records either. NGDC decided to scan the photographs to establish a new image database.

This scanning was in progress during my visit to NGDC and I had many discussions about resolution, file sizes and GUIs (graphical user interfaces). I realised that the same situation existed, not in only the UK, but throughout the European Community. As it turned out the situation in Europe was worse!

I was at this time collaborating with colleagues at EOST in Strasbourg on a British Council project. A chance mention of the concept of a European seismic scanning initiative was welcomed with an offer of partnership. This led to initial discussions with MAST officials on the feasibility of an EC funded-project directed at this problem. The MAST response encouraged the formation of the project team and the resulting proposal.

It was recognised from the outset that data in any form is personal to either a funding body, collecting institution or, in some cases, an individual. These facts had to be recognised and addressed at each stage of the proposal and it’s implementation. For the project to succeed, confidence was required in the team of ‘Partners’, in their integrity and their dedication to security. It was felt appropriate that the umbrella of MAST funding was best placed to provide the framework for this.

All members of the SEISCAN Partnership stress that our interest is in securing this data for the future and not to gain access to it. That will remain the prerogative of the data owners on whose co-operation we depend.

Peter Miles

Project Co-ordinator

Marine seismic reflection profiles have been collected in most European waters during scientific surveys by European academic institutes since the 1960's. Today, many of these data remain only as paper record sections. This is mainly due to the deterioration of recording media (magnetic tape) or the replay instrumentation no longer exists. The records often remain boxed and unreferenced; those of greater interest suffering more by handling and cutting. Generally these data cannot be recreated and, with few exceptions, have not been archived in any photographic or reproducible form.

SEISCAN is a new 3 year project to rescue early seismic reflection profiles funded by the European Commission MAST-III program from Brussels. The objective of MAST-III has been to foster the scientific knowledge and technical development necessary to understand how marine systems function at basin scales. This is in order to prepare for sustainable use of the oceans consistent with the management of marine environmental quality and determination of their role in global change.

The project will identify and locate seismic records, establish a metadata information base and enable large format digital scanning. This will create a seismic profile image database resource accessible to the wider scientific community. In addition to avoiding unnecessary reacquisition of seismic data, a complete archival of existing data will help guide the location of new survey lines. For the geoscientific communities SEISCAN will make more data available for academic research in general and hopefully encourage further international collaboration. The project will additionally provide data for monitoring the marine environment with direct relevance to the environmental impact of mass wasting, slope stability and the existence of gas hydrates.

The data in question are the electro-sensitive monochrome linescan paper records generally used to monitor seismic reflection data. These may already have been analysed, possibly published and now lie unreferenced, inaccessible to many marine science workers for new regional analyses. The target data area covers European Exclusive Economic Zone waters beyond the shelf break in the NE Atlantic, Norwegian-Greenland Sea and Mediterranean Sea. These data represent 30 years of research funding throughout the EC. Data that can be replayed from magnetic tape will not be included in the archive but the reconstruction of trace information on paper back to digital form (wiggly trace) is planned as a secondary objective.

SEISCAN is being co-ordinated from Southampton Oceanography Centre, UK (SOC) in collaboration with four partner European research centres:- Ecole et Observatoire des Sciences de la Terre, Université Louis Pasteur, Strasbourg; Facultat de Geologia, University of Barcelona; Geodynamic Institute, National Observatory of Athens; Osservatorio Geofisico Sperimentale di Trieste.

The scanning and processing of the data will be done using software supplied by CALDERA GRAPHICS on a UNIX platform. Images created by the project will be stored on CD-ROMs for immediate retention by contributing institutions. On completion of the project the images, their navigational information and metadata will be disseminated in a PC accessible format. Distribution of copies of the data sets with the major marine data centres and libraries will complete the data dissemination program.

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