Expedition SO288 took place between 15th of January and 15th of February, 2022 in the south eastern Pacific. The working ares was located off the North-Chilean coast. COMBO (Cojoint Monitoring of the Ocean Bottom Offshore Chile) is a yet another expedition within the GeoSEA project. During 2 cruises in 2015 detailled surveys were conducted and 23 transponders were deployed off the North Chilean coast. Objective of the GeoSEA project is the geophysical investigation of the subduction zone, in which the oceanic plate is pushed underneath the continental Nazca plate, marking the area earthquake prone.

Main tasks of ROV KIEL 6000 was the search and rescue of the seismic transponders, which were mounted in 4m high tripdodes, deployed in 2015 dureing SO244.

In order to recover both transponders and tripods, a recovery frame carrying a "rescue hook" and lights was deployed on a second wire off RV SONNE. ROV KIEL 600 located the hook and engaged it on the respective tripod. This method was successful but time-consuming. Thus, the last 15 of the 23 transponders were picked up by the ROVs manipulator and this way pulled out of the tripods. They were stored in one of the drawers and thus safely brought up to the surface. 

During SO288, 8 scientifc dives in water depths between 2800 and 5400 m were conducted. One dive had to be abandoned in a water depth of more the 5000m due to technical issues.

Publications to which ROV KIEL 6000 contributed.

Images (unless otherwise noted): ROV-Team GEOMAR; for enquiries on utilisation of image material please contact Pressestelle GEOMAR or Dr. Friedrich Abegg.