The multi-purpose research ship Alliance of the Navy arrived yesterday in the Icelandic port of Isafjordur to make a stop that will allow the alternation of a part of the scientific team of the Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution (WHOI), at the end of the first part of the naval campaign between the seas of Iceland and in Greenland, north of the Arctic Circle.
The campaign, organized with NATO's Center for Maritime Research and Experimentation (CMRE), has the main purpose of studying the air / water interaction and the relative ventilation that is created in the Arctic Sea, with the aim of achieving a better understanding of the circulation of marine currents.
In the sea areas explored, characterized by ice and low temperatures, the researchers on board, with the support of the Alliance crew, have so far carried out measurements of electrical conductivity parameters such as temperature, depth, geochemical analyzes and speed of the sound in water, bathymetric and thermographic surveys, bathymetry measurements and meteorological measurements (marine and aerial), as well as carrying out the correlation and statistical collection of the acquired data, as part of the multidisciplinary Iceland-Greenland Seas Project - IGP (https://www.bas.ac.uk/project/afis/).
Among the instruments used a meteorological buoy released in the area of operations to detect meteorological and marine data to support the CTD activity (surveys and measurements of electrical conductivity, temperature and depth of water) and some semi-autonomous submerged vehicles at remote control called ocean gliders which have the function of measuring the sea currents and the characteristics that make up the various layers of the Arctic Ocean.
It started last January 17th from La Spezia, under the command of frigate captain Daniele Cantù, Nave Alliance it can count on a crew of 47 soldiers to which, for the occasion, a research group consisting of 22 scientists from various international organizations is added. The head of the scientific mission is Dr. Robert Pickart, scientist of the WHOI, assisted by the head of the Navy mission, captain Massimiliano Nannini.
The ship will resume its activity at sea next 26 February, to return to Italy in April 2018.
