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posted by mrpg on Saturday December 15 2018, @12:23PM   Printer-friendly
from the found-me?-visit-https://www.noc.ac.uk dept.

Phys.org:

After going missing on Christmas Day five years ago, deep ocean measuring equipment belonging to the UK's National Oceanography Centre (NOC) has just been found on a beach in Tasmania by a local resident after making an incredible 14,000 km journey across the ocean.

In 2011, this deep-ocean lander instrument was deployed by NOC scientists in the northern Drake Passage, which is a narrow section of the ocean between South America and Antarctica. Measuring ocean bottom pressure here helps provide information on the Antarctic Circumpolar Current, which is the largest ocean current in the world. The instrument was due to spend two years collecting data at a depth of 1100 metres, before being recovered on Christmas Day in 2013 by a research expedition on the Royal Research Ship (RRS) James Clark Ross, operated by British Antarctic Survey. However it did not return to the surface as planned for reasons that are not clear, possibly due to something getting tangled up with the release mechanism.

After being presumed lost, the deep ocean instrument frame was discovered washed up on a beach on the western tip of Tasmania. After being made aware of the find, the manufacturers were able to use the serial numbers on two of the sensors on the frame to trace the NOC as the owners and contact them.

The image in the article serves up robust testimony to the differential ability of the probe's materials to resist marine fouling.


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  • (Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Saturday December 15 2018, @11:33PM

    by Anonymous Coward on Saturday December 15 2018, @11:33PM (#774964)

    Pro-Tip: They're connected. Google Moby-Duck.