Launching of a free-floating bio-optical profiler ...
On the morning of 3 March, the MOBYDICK team deployed a bio-optical profiler that will drift for nearly two years into Antarctic waters to regularly record temperature and salinity profiles as well as several optical properties that will allow estimating the phytoplankton biomass. The float goes on standby at 1000 m depth and goes up every 5 days to the surface to create a vertical measurement profile and transmit the data ashore by satellite.
Recovery of an instrumented mooring ...
Another operation at sea, particularly spectacular, March 7 in the late afternoon: The recovery of a mooring that has continuously recorded the evolution of the amount of particles and water motions since October 2016 to 500 m deep in the center of the submarine plateau of Kerguelen. This mooring of an ADCP current meter was dropped during the SOCLIM mission and was therefore recovered during the MOBYDICK mission, thanks to the dexterity and professionalism of the crew and the technical team of the RV Marion Dufresne.
