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Heard Island 1986-1987 Scientific Expedition Report

Entry ID: Heard_86-87_Report

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Summary

Abstract: Heard Island Expedition, 16 November 1986 to 21 January 1987, report written by Rod Ledingham, Officer in Charge.

Taken from the report:

The 1986-87 expedition was the second in a series of three consecutive expeditions planned to conduct new scientific work and to check on changes since the early wintering years from 1948-1954 and more recent sporadic visits by various government and private ... expeditions. We were dropped off at Heard Island on the 14th November 1986 by the Nella Dan.

The main thrust of this expedition was originally to have been geological but this was later expanded to cover biology and archaeology. Transport was provided by three Hughes 500 helicopters, old faithfuls VH-BAD piloted by John Robertson and VH-BAG piloted by Doug Crossan, and a new arrive from NZ, VH-HED flown by Phillip Turner, to provide speedy access to all areas of rock, either coastal or at high altitude on the mountain. Of particular interest to the geologists were the lavas of the January 1985 Big Ben eruption spotted by observers including Dick Williams, on the French vessel Marion Dufresne.

Despite some initial doubts about the possibility of flying, or even holding, aircraft at Heard for any length of time, and numerous relatively minor problems with weather and wind blown volcanic sand, the operation went very well and a great deal of new ground was covered, including several flights to the summit of Big Ben and the discovery of a new active crater and the expedition lava flows on the south-western slopes at Cape Arkona.

Two geologists accompanied the expedition, Jane Barling and Graeme Wheller. Geological mapping of the whole island was carried out by Jane where access was not too difficult or dangerous. Jane had previously worked on the samples brought back from Long Ridge and the summit by the Heard Island Expedition (private) on Anaconda II in 1983. The original map produced by Ainsworth in 1947 will be greatly improved when the material has been studied in more detail. The second geologist Graeme studied the relationships of the more recent lavas and attempted to get samples from the summit vent. The failure to do so was somewhat ameliorated by the finding of the new lava which it appears had emanated from the summit vent pipe and samples of summit rock were therefore available from 700m above Cape Arkona.

Further information about the botanical and biological work is available in the report.

Related URL

Link: GET DATA

Description: Download point for the report

Link: VIEW RELATED INFORMATION

Description: Citation reference for this metadata record and dataset

Geographic Coverage

(Click for Interactive Map)

Spatial coordinates

N: -53.07

S: -53.13

E: 73.56

W: 73.5

Temporal Coverage

Start Date: 1986-11-16

Stop Date: 1987-01-21

Location Keywords

OCEAN > SOUTHERN OCEAN

GEOGRAPHIC REGION > POLAR

OCEAN > SOUTHERN OCEAN > HEARD AND MCDONALD ISLANDS

Science Keywords

BIOSPHERE > VEGETATION > VEGETATION COVER

BIOSPHERE > VEGETATION > VEGETATION INDEX

ISO Topic Category

BIOTA

OCEANS

Project

MARMAP > Marine Resources, Monitoring, Assessment and Prediction

OBIS > OCEAN BIOGEOGRAPHIC INFORMATION SYSTEM

COML > CENSUS OF MARINE LIFE

Quality ATTRIBUTE ACCURACY REPORT: The data has been in use by the agency and other agencies since its inception. The database has undergone rigorous quality checks.

HORIZONTAL POSITIONAL ACCURACY REPORT: Used Differential GPS. Data is truncated to 2nd decimal point (about 1500 meters) with respect to location due to confidentiality.

Access Constraints To view constraints placed on dataset, please see Policy and Disclaimer section (from the panel on the left) on OBIS-USA web site at http://www.usgs.gov/obis-usa.

DISTRIBUTION LIABILITY: OBIS-USA renders information prepared by contributors accessible through dynamic on-line publication. It does not peer-review the quality of the data provided. However, it is confident that the data ...

Use Constraints Prior to use of these records in any analysis or report, MARMAP must be notified and if used the provenance of the original data must be acknowledged. Acknowledge the use of specific records from contributing MARMAP databases and acknowledge the use of the OBIS-USA facility. Recognize the limitations of data in OBIS-USA.

Ancillary Keywords

Neuston Net

MARMAP