deepseasgroup - traditional equipment
The deepseas group has a range of 'traditional' sea-going equipment that enables us to sample and observe the deep-sea floor and its inhabitats - all of our equipment is capable of operating to 6,000m water depth (3.7 miles; 19,685 feet).
Seabed coring systems
Multicorer - high quality seabed core samples, carries 12 5cm diameter core tubes.
Megacorer - high quality seabed core samples, carries up to 12 10cm diameter core tubes.
Box corer (USNEL-type; available from the National Marine Equipment Pool) - single large (50 x 50cm) seabed core sample.
Towed gear
Epibenthic sledge - fitted with 1 or 3 fine mesh nets (1-4mm), also carries acoustic telemetry and camera systems.
Otter trawl (no, not for catching otters !) - a small commerial shrimp trawl, may be fitted with acoustic telemetry system.
Photographic survey equipment
WASP vehicle - deep-tow camera platform, carries still (conventional) camera and digital video camera, altimeter activated (normally operating about 3m above seafloor), with acoustic telemetry (requires mechanical cable only, i.e. not conducting or fibre optic cable).
AUTOSUB camera system - digital still camera and flash system designed for operation on deep-water seafloor survey AUVs. System lost aboard Autosub2 beneath Fimbul Iceshelf (Antarctic) - new system in design phase.
Landers / Moorings
Amphipod trap - simple acoustically released mooring fitted with baited traps intended to capture scavenging amphipods - new trap design now in use.
Bathysnap (old form) - deep-seafloor time-lapse camera system, typically deployed with a recording current meter (as shown in left imge).
Bathysnap (new form 'Roughsnap') - new form of enclosing Bathysnap frame, the conventional stills camera (as shown below) has now been replaced with a digital system.
