Deep Platforms

Operator: GEOMAR
Further Information

The ROV KIEL 6000 (remotely operated vehicle) has been designed for scientific purposes with an operational depth rating of 6000m.

Remote control, data communication and live video streams are facilitated by a deep-sea glass fibre cable. The glass fibres are enclosed in a 19mm thick cable which also provides the electrical power for the thruster, hydraulics, cameras and lights.

The vehicle is an electrically powered work class (class III) ROV which has been manufactured by Schilling Robotics, LLC, Davis, California. Its modular concept allows for different scientific payloads.

With a depth rating of 6000m it is capable of reaching 95% of the world’s seafloor. The ROV can be operated from ships of opportunity which fullfill certain requirements like dynamic positioning (DP), bearing capacity, electric and crane/winch capacity.

KIEL 6000 will be used for multidisciplinary scientific projects and for the installation and maintainance of ocean observatories.

Procurement of the ROV has been realised by the Schleswig-Holstein Fund.

Operator: GEOMAR
Further Information

JAGO is a manned submersible primarily dedicated to exploration and research in marine sciences. It allows researchers of different disciplines a personal view on the seafloor to a depth of 400 meters.

The submersible moves autonomously underwater and is not connected by an umbrilical cable to a support ship. Two large hemispherical viewports provide excellent views of the sea bed and surrounding environment for both the pilot and one observer.

The relatively light weight (3 tons) and the compact size (3 x 2 x 2.5 m) enable worldwide operations from a wide variety of support ships that have sufficient crane capacity, as well as logistically simple transportation in a single 20' sea freight container.

Typical applications are deep-water exploration of the seafloor and overlying water column; digital photo/video documentation; selective collection of specific organisms, rock, gas and water samples; deployment of instruments; environmental impact studies; inspections and salvages.

JAGO is presently the only manned research submersible in Germany. It has been stationed at the Helmholtz Centre for Ocean Research (GEOMAR) since 2006. The craft was built in 1989, according to the rules of the Germanischer Lloyd for underwater vehicles, by a small expert team at the former Max Planck Institute for Behavioural Physiology in Bavaria.

Operator: Marum Institute
Further Information

The Alstom Schilling Robotics (ASR) remotely operated vehicle (ROV), QUEST, that is stationed in Bremen is a commercial robotics system developed over the past five years primarily for routine offshore industrial deployment in the deep sea. It has proven its value over several years. In contrast to the commercial model, the Bremen QUEST has been adapted for scientific deployment and for diving in water depths down to 4000 meters.

During its development, a series of new technological achievements have been made with numerous practical objectives that did not exist for any other systems. These include an extremely efficient energy transfer, a greatly simplified but very capable telemetry and data allocation, a new kind of power system with coreless electric motors, as well as a generally modular and trim system design.

Using a power cable with a thickness of only 17.6 mm reduced the weight of the handling system to less than 15 tonnes, so that deployment on the large German research vessels is possible without constructional changes to the ships.

For marine research this makes a working platform available that can be adapted to very different missions with relatively little technical effort and expense. Especially valuable is the unique combination of the available scientifically usable energy with the extremely precise positioning capability through the incorporation of acoustic Doppler-log data in the autopilot controls (e.g.,for video transects, absolutely positioned sampling, and cm-accurate grids).

After its initial successful deployment on M58/3 in June 2003 on the METEOR, further cruises are carried out on a regular basis, including cruises for the DFG thematic program, 'SPP 1144, Spreading centers at mid-ocean ridges' and the DFG research center Ocean Margins.

Operator: NIOZ
Further Information

Wet Lab Container: Standard 20 foot container, including ventilation and airco system.

Cooled Lab Container: Standard 20 foot container, including air-conditioning and ventilation system.

Clean Room Container: Standard 20 foot container, including air-conditioning, air filtration and ventilation system. Clean room class: 100 - 1.000.

Autoanalyzer Container: Standard 20 foot container, including ventilationsystem, airco, heating, Milli-RO and Milli-Q waterinstallation. Maximum 4 different nutrients can be analysed in 1 container with a maximum of 800 analyses per day.

Cool/Freeze Storage Container: Standard 20 foot container, including storage racks.

Office Container: Standard 20 foot container, including ventilation system.

Transport Container: Standard 20 foot container.

Special Purpose Containers:

• Oxygen & Salinity Analyzing lab
• Scanfish container
• Isotope laboratory
• Seismic Data Lab
• Moorings Service Container(NO POOL)
• Ultra Clean CTD container
• XRF Core Scanner container
• Seismic Compressor container
• Fish Processing container(NO POOL)
• 10’ Incubation container(NO POOL)
• Isotope laboratory

Operator: IMR
Further Information

The Calypso corer system was ordered from Kley France to be equipped on the new research vessel G.O. Sars, delivered April 2003. It consists of a corer sampler with a total weight of 3800 kg, a winch/drum and a control container. The Calypso corer is capable of making sedimental samples up to 22 meters at a depth of total 6000m, on the G.O. Sars version, and the 9 tonnes scientific winch is made for multi purpose use.

The winch and the drum is mounted on a 20ft container platform (separates into two 10ft platform to ease loading). The control is mounted in a 10ft container.

In addition to this there is a 10ft corer deployment platform, hydraulic adjustable, for launch/recovery operations.

The Calypso corer is released from the main cable approximately 1 meter above sea floor. An internal wire connected to a piston at the bottom of the corer helps neutralizing the pressure at impact and also connects the corer to main cable for recovery.

The system is powered by 440 VAC/ 60Hz.

Operator: NERC
Further Information

ISIS is a remotely operated vehicle capable of descending to 6500m below the surface of the ocean.

An operator in the control van aboard the mother ship can guide the vehicle to precise locations by sending commands to the vehicle's thrusters. Once there the operator can use the ROV's manipulators like arms and hands to do scientific tasks such as taking samples and deploying instruments. The operator can view the sea floor through up to 8 separate cameras mounted on the vehicle.

ISIS also has sophisticated sonar systems to make high resolution bathymetry maps of the seafloor as well as chemical sensors and a 'slurp' gun to take mid water biological samples.

Operator: NERC
Further Information

Sea floor High Resolution Imaging Platform (SHRIMP) is NOC’S high resolution deep-towed camera platform. It carries still photograph camera as well as downward looking video cameras, which send live images to the ship along a single mode fibre optic link, from depths of up to 5000m.