CE19008 Cruise Report: Monitoring Changes in Submarine Canyon Coral Habitats - Leg 1 (MoCha_SCan)

• Main Authors: Lim, Aaron, O' Reilly, Luke, Summers, Gerard, Harris, Kim, Shine, Andrew, Harman, Luke, Macedo, Larissa, Boyd, John, Anders, Bebhinn, Killeen, Orla, Conti, Luis, O' Brien, Martina, Holland 1 ROV technical team, Officers and Crew of the RV Celtic Explorer
• Format: Report
• Language: English
• Published: Zenodo 2020
• Subjects: Porcupine Bank Canyon, cold water corals, deep sea habitats, NE Atlantic; Kane; Luke; Porcupine Bank; Porcupine Seabight; Northeast Atlantic
• Online Access: https://dx.doi.org/10.5281/zenodo.3699111; https://zenodo.org/record/3699111

Cruise report - Executive Summary This survey focused on the maiden deployment of a number of novel, ROV-adapted lander systems in the Porcupine Bank Canyon (PBC) coral habitats, NE Atlantic. Cold water corals (CWCs) flourish on the Irish-Atlantic margin between 600 and 100 m water depth, where they form a number of structural habitat types (coral reefs, mounds and gardens). Recent research shows that deep water habitats, including CWC habitats on the Irish margin, may be impacted by recent environmental change. The main objectives of this survey are: a) to deploy 8 new lander systems within a range of coral habitats throughout the PBC; b) to complete mapping coverage within the PBC; c) to sample the coral, sediment and ambient watermass around the lander sites and; d) to sample particulate organic matter around key coral habitats. Data recorded via landers from each habitat will allow to determine the controls on habitat variability. Furthermore, this data can be used as a baseline to which later deployments at this site will be used to compare against. Completed canyon coverage will feed into a number of multiscale mapping projects including the H2020 project “Integrated Assessment of Atlantic Marine Ecosystems in Space & Time” (iATLANTIC) and the SFI-, GSI- and MI-funded “Mapping, Modelling and Monitoring Key Processes and Controls on Cold Water Coral Habitats in Submarine Canyons” (MMMonKey_Pro) programme. Video data will be used to characterise key coral habitat within the canyon and subsequesntly, HD DEM’s will be generated as a central dataset for the multiscale projects listed above. : Funding information: This research survey is carried out with the support of the Marine Institute, funded under the Marine Research Programme 2014-2020 by the Irish Government to support and promote the Atlantic Ocean Research Alliance (2018-2021). Aaron Lim, Luke O' Reilly, John Appah, Kim Harris and Larissa Macedo are funded by the Science Foundation of Ireland Investigator Program (co-funded by the Marine Insititue and Geological Survey, Ireland). : {"references": ["Beyer, A., Schenke, H.W., Klenke, M., Niederjasper, F., 2003. High resolution bathymetry of the eastern slope of the Porcupine Seabight. Marine Geology 198, 27-54", "Conti, L.A., Lim, A., Wheeler, A.J., 2019. High resolution mapping of a cold water coral mound. Scientific Reports 9, 101610.1038/s41598-018-37725-x", "Dorschel, B., Hebbeln, D., R\u00fcggeberg, A., Dullo, W.-C., Freiwald, A., 2005. Growth and erosion of a cold-water coral covered carbonate mound in the Northeast Atlantic during the late Pleistocene and Holocene. Earth and Planetary Science Letters 233, 33-44", "Dorschel, B., Wheeler, A.J., Monteys, X., Verbruggen, K., 2010. Atlas of the Deep-water Seabed: Ireland. Springer, Dordrecht Heidelberg London New York", "Huvenne, V.A.I., Beyer, A., de Haas, H., Dekindt, K., Henriet, J.-P., Kozachenko, M., Olu-Le Roy, K., Wheeler, A.J., participants, T.P.c., participants, C.c., 2005. The seabed appearance of different coral bank provinces in the Porcupine Seabight, NE Atlantic: results from sidescan sonar and ROV seabed mapping, in: Freiwald, A., Roberts, J.M. (Eds.), Cold-water Corals and Ecosystems. Springer-Verlag, Berlin Heidelberg, pp. 535-569", "Lim, A., Huvenne, V.A.I., Vertino, A., Spezzaferri, S., Wheeler, A.J., 2018. New insights on coral mound development from groundtruthed high-resolution ROV-mounted multibeam imaging. Marine Geology 403, 225-237", "Lim, A., Kane, A., Arnaubec, A., Wheeler, A.J., 2018. Seabed image acquisition and survey design for cold water coral mound characterisation. Marine Geology 395, 22-32", "Lim, A., Wheeler, A.J., Arnaubec, A., 2017. High-resolution facies zonation within a cold-water coral mound: The case of the Piddington Mound, Porcupine Seabight, NE Atlantic. Marine Geology 390, 120-130", "Wheeler, A.J., Beyer, A., Freiwald, A., de Haas, H., Huvenne, V.A.I., Kozachenko, M., Olu-Le Roy, K., Opderbecke, J., 2007. Morphology and environment of cold-water coral carbonate mounds on the NW European margin. International Journal of Earth Sciences 96, 37-56"]}