The 27 October, Ship Alliance, NATO's multi-purpose hydro-oceanographic research unit, with crew of the Italian Navy, started from the Norwegian port of Tromsø to the Arctic Ocean for the HIGH NORTH19 campaign.
The activity is part of the multi-year Research Program in Arctic of the High North 2017-2019 Navy coordinated and conducted by the Hydrographic Institute of the Navy, with the participation of various national and international research bodies such as NATO STO-CMRE, JRC - Center of Research of the European Union, National Research Council (CNR), National Agency for New Technologies, Energy and Economic Development (ENEA), the National Institute of Geophysics and Volcanology (INGV), National Institute of Oceanography and of Experimental Geophysics (OGS), European Research Institute (ERI) and industry (e-GEOS).
HIGH NORTH19, the fourth Arctic campaign of marine geophysics, this year will see the temporal continuity in environmental observation, the observation maintenance, the maintenance of annual acquisition systems such as the S1 and ID2 mooring as well as the collection of new data, from the atmosphere at the sea bottom in relation to the ice.
In particular from the 2014 the sites S1 and ID2 are part of the international observation network of Svalbard, SIOS - Svalbard Integrated Arctic Earth Observing System thanks to the contribution of CNR, OGS, Navy - Hydrographic Institute of the Navy.
During High North19 activities will be developed in the marine sector in the South and West of the Svalbard Islands and the Fram Strait with the exploration of the seabed and the acquisition of data in the water column and in the atmosphere to complement the activities carried out in the previous campaigns .
Throughout the campaign period, particular attention will be paid to supporting navigation in extreme environments and between the ice with ARNACOSKY (Arctic Navigation with CosmoSKYMed), a joint research project between e-geos and IIM.
Technological and satellite development in extreme environments, in particular, are pivotal to the activities of the HIGH NORTH program, in line with the recent growth sustained by operational potential and great interest in the polar sectors.
Nave Alliance will return to the Tromso port on the next 1 November to conclude the High North 2019 campaign the following day.
