“Every dive revealed something new,” he said. “It’s a juggling game between remembering you are on a sub and have a job to do: you’ve got to do things to do to keep sub going, but at the same time [you’re thinking], ‘This is amazing’ and you have to take a moment [to say], ‘This is nuts’.”
The research centre’s next trip will be off the coast of south-east Australia in March before it dives into the deepest trenches near Japan in June.
Professor Jamison has been alarmed by the amount of rubbish floating through the ocean. “There are plastic bags everywhere,” he said. “The junk on the ocean’s surface has a one-way ticket to the deep sea – where it will remain.”
During the centre’s first research project, scientists spent hours documenting the ocean floor and marine ecosystems in a submersible and via video.Credit: Minderoo-UWA
Dr Forrest traces his passion for marine conservation back to when he was a young boy camping with his parents along the West Australian coastline. The Fortescue Metals chair eventually turned that passion into a PhD in 2019.
“We need to consider the ocean as one big body of water,” Dr Forrest said. “We know a lot about the top 2000 metres and then as you get deeper, our understanding becomes less and less.
“It’s Minderoo Foundation’s aim to fill in the gaps for that deepest 50 per cent of the ocean, so we can better understand how to treat the ocean as a whole and understand what it is telling us about the pressure we are putting on it.”
Loading
UWA Vice-Chancellor Professor Amit Chakma welcomed the investment in deep-sea research, particularly in one of the world’s most unexplored areas.
University of NSW professor of oceanography Moninya Roughan said while the ocean covered about 70 per cent of the earth’s surface, there were many mysteries lurking below. Each time she goes out to sea, Professor Roughan and her team map new parts of the ocean that have never been plotted.
“It’s super challenging to measure, model and predict,” she said. “It’s chaotic, deep and anything you put in the ocean needs to withstand large amounts of pressure. It’s just a massive volume of water, it’s a challenging dynamic environment.”
The Morning Edition newsletter is our guide to the day’s most important and interesting stories, analysis and insights. Sign up here.
‘It’s like another world’: Project to unlock secrets of ocean’s deepest trenches
Source: Philippines Alive
