High North19 was the third Marine Geophysics Arctic Campaign of the 2017-2019 Arctic Research Program by the Italian Navy on board the Alliance off the Svalbard Archipelago. The 2019 campaign started on 27 October in Tromsø, Norway, and ended on 7 November in Bergen, due to the harsh weather conditions that prevented the expected return to Tromsø.
On board the Alliance there were a Navy crew of 50, commander Andrea Crucitti, and a team of scientists coordinated by Prof Roberta Ivaldi and commander Maurizio Demarte – both from the IIM – including 19 researchers from major national and international research centres - CNR, ENEA, ERI, INGV, OGS, e-Geos, JRC-EU, NATO STO- CMRE.
The High North campaigns acquired a special meaning right from the start and has provided a huge contribution to research in a time of particular concern with environmental and climate change issues. The Arctic Ocean is a highly sensitive area, data are still scarce, and the data collected in the 2017- 2019 campaigns have proved very valuable.
High North19 was operational from the first day. A thick schedule of activities were carried out under severe environmental conditions, very dynamic and complex, in an unfavorable season, up to 79° 02’ N.
Research activities took place from October 27 to October 31, along the route to the Svalbard islands, in the Norwegian Sea and in the western sector of the archipelago itself, in the Greenland Sea and in the Arctic Ocean.
Monitoring activities were carried out
Southern Ionian Sea
wave mean period and direction
High North 19 logo
ITS Alliance under sailing during High North19 campaign
to assess short and long-term variability of the marine environment, testing new technologies with multi- platform systems from satellite to background, and collecting precious knowledge on sustainability and environmental protection.
Thanks to a good synergy between the scientific team and the crew, the campaign was efficiently and effectively carried out, notwithstanding numerous challenges, achieving the common goal set forth in the planning stage through a multidisciplinary and integrated action.
Specifically, the activities included MBES (multibeam echosounder) mapping of 4,227 square kilometers of seabed and sampling of environmental data in 70 sites - 22 observation transects, 20 for bio-optical measurements, 7 for physical and bio-geochemical parameters of the water column, 11 for marine pollution and 4 sampling sessions of macro and
micro-The Alliance crew
!
Scoresbyund
Longyearbyen
I. Jan Mayen (Norvegia)
NON VALIDA PER LA NAVIGAZIONE MANTENETE PULITO IL VOSTRO MARE
QUESTA RAPPRESENTAZIONE NON E’ UNA CARTA NAUTICA Questa carta contiene dati protetti da Copyright. Qualsiasi riproduzione
o adattamento in qualsiasi forma, anche parziale, ivi comprese elaborazione numeriche o fotocopie, è vietata senza una preventiva autorizzazione scritta da parte dell'Istituto Idrografico della Marina.
Pubblicata dall'Istituto Idrografico della Marina - Genova, Giugno 2018 - Direttore L. Sinapi, Contrammiraglio
© Copyright, I.I.M. Genova 2018 80°N
85°N
MANTENIAMO PULITO IL NOSTRO MARE
v
NON VALIDA PER LA NAVIGAZIONE
QUESTA RAPPRESENTAZIONE NON E’ UNA CARTA NAUTICA
Campagna HIGH NORTH 19 NAVE ALLIANCE
23 - 31 OTTOBRE 2019
in collaborazione con:
TROMSØ 23 OTTOBRE 2019 31 OTTOBRE 2019
High North 19 route
to assess short and long-term variability of the marine environment, testing new technologies with multi- platform systems from satellite to background, and collecting precious knowledge on sustainability and environmental protection.
Thanks to a good synergy between the scientific team and the crew, the campaign was efficiently and effectively carried out, notwithstanding numerous challenges, achieving the common goal set forth in the planning stage through a multidisciplinary and integrated action.
Specifically, the activities included MBES (multibeam echosounder) mapping of 4,227 square kilometers of seabed and sampling of environmental data in 70 sites - 22 observation transects, 20 for bio-optical measurements, 7 for physical and bio-geochemical parameters of the water column, 11 for marine pollution and 4 sampling sessions of macro and
micro-The Alliance crew
!
Scoresbyund
Longyearbyen
I. Jan Mayen (Norvegia)
NON VALIDA PER LA NAVIGAZIONE MANTENETE PULITO IL VOSTRO MARE
QUESTA RAPPRESENTAZIONE NON E’ UNA CARTA NAUTICA Questa carta contiene dati protetti da Copyright. Qualsiasi riproduzione
o adattamento in qualsiasi forma, anche parziale, ivi comprese elaborazione numeriche o fotocopie, è vietata senza una preventiva autorizzazione scritta da parte dell'Istituto Idrografico della Marina.
Pubblicata dall'Istituto Idrografico della Marina - Genova, Giugno 2018 - Direttore L. Sinapi, Contrammiraglio
© Copyright, I.I.M. Genova 2018 80°N
85°N
MANTENIAMO PULITO IL NOSTRO MARE
v
NON VALIDA PER LA NAVIGAZIONE
QUESTA RAPPRESENTAZIONE NON E’ UNA CARTA NAUTICA
Campagna HIGH NORTH 19 NAVE ALLIANCE
23 - 31 OTTOBRE 2019
in collaborazione con:
TROMSØ 23 OTTOBRE 2019 31 OTTOBRE 2019
High North 19 route
nano plastics, resulting in the collection of fragments of different sizes along 800 M out of a total of 2,300 M. It should be noted that no floating marine litter or plastic were observed.
Maintenance was carried out for two moorings, S1 and ID2. Moorings are a collection of devices connected to a wire and anchored on the sea floor - CTD-sensors, current meters, and sediment traps. Moorings S1 and ID2 have been monitoring the water column in the Arctic Ocean since 2014 and are part of the international network of observation SIOS (Svalbard Integrated Arctic Earth Observing System).
Moorings are unique data sources for the whole scientific community concerned with the study of climate changes in the Arctic Ocean, a key sector for understanding the evolution of climate and its impact on the planet and on global economy.
High North19 has ensured that this crucial monitoring has the necessary continuity in time and space by recoverying, maintening and repositioning the devices, so that data can be collected throughtout the year, until the next check, scheduled for next summer.
Just after completing maintanenace to of the second mooring (S1), the weather turned abruptly and the Alliance could not sail on. The schedule had to be changed and new data were collected in an area still to be explored, populating the GEBCO-IBCAO databases and contributing to global mapping project “Seabed 2030” .
Meteomarine data were also acquired - intensity of the wind, waves, current, air pressure, rainfall, temperature and humidity – in view of new meteorological forecasting models, to develop a tool supporting polar navigation according to a joint project by e-Geos and the Istituto Idrografico della
Analysing samples on board the Alliance
Recovering a mooring buoy from the Alliance launch
Lowering the sediment trap
Marina called ARNACOSKY (ARctic NAvigation with COsmo SKYmed), from satellite to background, to improve environmental sustainability and ocean knowledge. ARNACOSKY represents the very philosophy of the High North program, as its object is to provide for an integrated assessment of Arctic navigation sustainability, with environmental monitoring and weather forecasting, using multiple platforms, including radar satellite COSMO-SkyMed. COSMO-SkyMed consists in a constellation of four satellites with radar sensors that can operate under any weather and visibility conditions.