We’ve showed you this beautiful photo from onboard Southern Surveyor, before with students Isabella Rosso (left) and Kate Snow setting up the 24 bottle CTD rosette, while on the voyage to Timor-Leste waters in September 2012.
The CTD is able to measure the conductivity and temperature of the ocean while it is being lowered into the ocean. The conductivity enables us to determine salinity. The CTD also takes water samples of the ocean at different depths for analysis in the laboratory and on Southern Surveyor we can take these samples up to 6,000 metres below the surface.
On RV Investigator we will have a 24 bottle and a 36 bottle CTD rosette that can be deployed up to 6,500 metres below the ocean’s surface!
The parts for the 24 bottle CTD rosette have started to arrive in Hobart, and Dr Lindsay Pender, who is part of the Future Research Vessel Project Technical Team, was there to inspect the components we have so far.
The little stainless steel ring on top of the CTD rosette is a bit deceiving, it looks like it would weigh nothing, but it’s about 60 kilograms; which is why we needed Leigh Roberts from the CSIRO Marine and Atmospheric Research store and his fork lift to help us out!
