Louisiana Universities Marine Consortium (LUMCON) proposes to support technical services on R/V Pelican, a 105? general purpose research vessel operated by the consortium as part of the University-National Oceanographic Laboratory System research fleet. They request support only for basic services; they will provide one technician on each seagoing research project. In addition, the technical services group will maintain, calibrate and provide for qualified users items from their pool of shared-use research instrumentation. The budget in this proposal is for the first year of a 3-year continuing grant.
2009-2011 Oceanographic Technical Services Final Report The R/V Pelican completed 685 days at sea during the period of 2009-2011 of which 53 sea days or 7.7% were in support of NSF funded research. During this period the R/V Pelican averaged 228 days at sea per year with an average of 17.7 sea days of NSF funded research. Technical Services were provided for every cruise aboard the R/V Pelican. During years 2009, 2010 and 2011 the daily cost of these services were $1,100, $1,110, and $1,200 respectively. A summary of funded days are as follows: 2009 2010 2011 TOTALS NSF 20 14 19 53 NAVY 34 15 36 85 NOAA 79 112 71 262 USGS 4 4 4 12 MMS 57 63 35(BOEMRE) 155 Other 47 29 42 118 TOTAL 241 237 207 685 The sea going technical support group at LUMCON is a part of the Marine Operations Section. This section functions within the Marine Operations Division at the Institution. The two Marine Technicians in this group report directly to the Marine Superintendent who in turn reports to the Executive Director. Both Marine Technicians assume the major responsibilities for the management of this group. It is their duty to schedule the daily activities in this section, execute maintenance and calibration schedules for the various pieces of equipment in the pool of shared use equipment, and perform repairs and upgrades to the pool equipment. They are also responsible for recommending improvements to the marine technical capabilities of the ship. The Marine Technicians rotate on and off the ship and contend with the shore base duties as necessary. At sea, the Marine Tech is responsible for typical tech duties including maintenance and operation of scientific sampling gear, and providing aid and assistance to the science users of the vessel. The R/V Pelican was designed and outfitted to conduct a variety of oceanographic research missions. The reliability, utility and seaworthiness of this vessel have been well demonstrated. The R/V Pelican successfully conducts scientific trawling, large box core sampling, thirty-foot piston cores, shallow seismic surveys, current meter array and benthic boundary array deployment and recovery. The R/V Pelican has also successfully conducted plankton sampling, hydrographic casts with CTD-rosette system and underway sampling with towed water sampling systems. The R/V Pelican is operated as an Oceanographic Research Vessel as designated by the United States Coast Guard and is maintained as an American Bureau of Shipping (ABS) Load Line vessel. The Consortium is a member UNOLS and the R/V Pelican is a designated UNOLS vessel. The vessel is available for legitimate research and education programs of Consortium members, state and federal agencies, other nonprofit groups, and oceanographic industries. NSF cruise summaries are as follows: 2009 Collaborative Research: Tracer Distributions, Chemical Fluxes, and Distributary Comparisons in the Mixing Zone of the Mississippi River, Alan Shiller (University of Southern Mississippi), James Krest (University of South Florida), and Kyeong Park (Dauphin Island Sea Lab). "Benthic Dinoflagellate Migration (BenDiM): Occurrence and Processes" Daniel Kamykowski (NCSU), Carrie Thomas (NCSU), Gerald Janowitz (NCSU), and John Morrison (UNCW). 2010 "Rapid: Impacts of the Deepwater Horizon crude oil spill on the diversity of macroalgae and macrocrustaceans inhabiting deepwater hard banks in the N, W, NE, and SE Gulf of Mexico, Darryl L. Felder (ULL). RAPID Collaborative Proposal: Spatially-explicit, High-resolution Mapping and Modeling to Quantify Hypoxia and Oil Effects on the Living Resources of the Northern Gulf of Mexico, Mike Roman. Ajit Subramaniam, The emergency retrieval of a APEX float in the GOM. 2011 Benthic Dinoflagellate Migration (BenDiM): Occurrence and Processes, Daniel Kamykowski (NCSU), Carrie Thomas (NCSU), Geoff Sinclair (LUMCON), and John Morrison (UNCW). Rapid: Impacts of the Deepwater Horizon crude oil spill on the diversity of macroalgae and macrocrustaceans inhabiting deepwater hard banks in the N, W, NE, and SE Gulf of Mexico, Darryl L. Felder (ULL).
