Azores Deep-sea Research — Cruise MapGES 2019

MapGES 2019

Mapping deep-sea biodiversity and “Good Environmental Status” in the Azores

MapGES 2019

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Mapping deep-sea biodiversity and “Good Environmental Status” in the Azores

Location: Southern Mid-Atlantic Ridge and Faial (Azores EEZ)

Year: 2019

158 stations

155 dives

3070 km transits

8 areas visited

AZORES DEEP-SEA RESEARCH

Summary

Mapping deep-sea biodiversity and “Good Environmental Status” in the Azores

The MapGES 2019 cruise spanned a total of 21 effective days of work at sea, in which 8 different areas were explored with the Azor drift-cam system. A total of 155 deployments were made throughout the whole cruise, which add up to more than 109 hours of bottom time. The number of dives performed in each area was based on the size of the seamounts to be explored, the meteorological conditions and the ecological significance of the communities found. Overall, more than 80 linear km of seabed were investigated, ranging from 6 km explored in Capelinhos to more than 16 km in the Cavala, Beta, Ferradura and A6 seamount complex. The average dive length was 550 m, with 16 dives covering more than 1 linear km of seabed. Such long dives provide an idea of the great capacity of the drift-cam system to easily explore deep-sea areas when sea conditions are favourable. The system got caught a total of 7 times in fishing lines throughout the cruise but came back to the surface in perfect conditions in all cases.

MapGES 2019 aimed to continue testing the improved version of the low-cost, custom-made drift-cam video system designed and developed at IMAR and Okeanos University of the Azores. The video system, named the Azor drift-cam, was equipped with one 4K resolution action camera that records high-quality images of the benthic ecosystem of the Azores deep-sea. It also has low-cost sensors that provide depth and temperature records every second. The new egg-shaped design facilitates the disentanglement from lost fishing gears once the drift-cam system gets caught, although their presence still limits the possibility of safely exploring seamounts that are heavily fished. From a scientific perspective, the cruise aimed to characterize the megabenthic communities dwelling between 200 and 750 m depth in areas of the Mid-Atlantic Ridge (MAR) and small seamounts close to the islands of Faial and Pico.

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Statistics

Transits

3070 km

Multibeam Bathymetry

0 km²

Filmed Seabed

80 km

Visited Areas

Stations

158

Dives

155

Video Footage Recorded

109 hours

Used Storage

7.16 Tb

Samples

— No information available at this moment

Highlights

We successfully tested the new design of the Azor drift-cam system developed at IMAR and Okeanos, University of the Azores.
We explored over 80 km of seabed down to 750 m depth in 8 different areas for which little or no information of its benthic communities was available
The seamounts explored along the MAR host diverse benthic ecosystems with several structurally complex benthic communities identified. In most cases, the communities were dominated by octocoral species or large sponges. Some of the areas explored may fit the FAO definition of what constitutes a VME.
In the slopes of Faial island, close to Capelinhos volcano, we discovered a large aggregation of the endemic hydrocoral Errina dabneyi in association with other octocoral species, between 300 and 450 m depth.
We discovered new sites that host diverse coral gardens and sponge grounds and collected new data on the distribution of VMEs in the seamounts of the Mid-Atlantic Ridge and the Azores island slopes.

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Location of operation

Southern Mid-Atlantic Ridge and Faial (Azores EEZ)

AZORES DEEP-SEA RESEARCH © CRUISES

Stations

MapGES 2019

Leg	Period	Days at sea	Vessel	Departure	Return
1	23/07/2019 - 02/08/2019	11	RV Arquipélago	Horta	Horta
2	13/08/2019 - 24/08/2019	12	RV Arquipélago	Horta	Horta
3	26/08/2019 - 03/09/2019	9	RV Arquipélago	Horta	Horta
4	15/11/2019 - 16/11/2019	2	RV Arquipélago	Horta	Horta

A total of 34 days at sea

Activities

Video survey (Azor drift-cam)

Cruise crew

Chief scientist

Telmo Morato

Scientific crew

Carlos Dominguez-Carrió

Laurence Fauconnet

Manuela Ramos

Sérgio Gomes

Gerald H. Taranto

Jordi Blasco

Laurence Fauconnet

Cristina G. Zárate

Collaborators

Marina Carreiro-Silva

MapGES 2019: Summer 2019 cruise on board of N/I Arquipélago

Zenodo

Mar, 2020

7 team members are authors

OA Citations 1 DOI 10.5281/zenodo.3727570

Authors 10.5281/zenodo.3727570

Telmo Morato

Carlos Dominguez‐Carrió

Sérgio Gomes

Gerald H. Taranto Jordi Blasco

Manuela Ramos

Laurence Fauconnet Cristina G. Zárate

Marina Carreiro‐Silva

Abstract

Objective: to explore seamounts of the Azorean archipelago to better understand the distribution patterns of VMEs and commercial fish species. A special interest was placed in exploring deep-sea areas along the Mid Atlantic Ridge and close to islands of the central group. The device used in this survey corresponds to the low-cost drift-cam video platform designed and developed at IMAR. Vessel: N/I Arquipélago Chief scientist: Telmo Morato Scientific team: Telmo Morato, Carlos Dominguez-Carrió, Sérgio Gomes, Gerald H. Taranto, Jordi Blasco, Manuela Ramos, Laurence Fauconnet, Cristina G. Zárate, Marina Carreiro-Silva Main achievements: Successfully tested the new design of the low-cost drift-cam system developed at IMAR Exploration of over 80 km of seabed down to 750 m depth in 8 different areas for which little or no information of its benthic communities was available Discovery of new sites that host diverse coral gardens and sponge grounds that were unknown to science New data on the distribution of VMEs in the seamounts of the Mid-Atlantic Ridge

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Spatial distributions, environmental drivers and co-existence patterns of key cold-water corals in the deep sea of the Azores (NE Atlantic)

Deep Sea Research Part I Oceanographic Research Papers

Mar, 2023

7 team members are authors

OA Citations 20 DOI 10.1016/j.dsr.2023.104028

Authors 10.1016/j.dsr.2023.104028

Gerald H. Taranto

José Manuel González‐Irusta

Carlos Dominguez‐Carrió Christopher K. Pham Fernando Tempera

Manuela Ramos

Guilherme Gonçalves

Marina Carreiro‐Silva

Telmo Morato

A cost‐effective video system for a rapid appraisal of deep‐sea benthic habitats: The Azor drift‐cam

Methods in Ecology and Evolution

Apr, 2021

2 team members are authors

OA Citations 38 DOI 10.1111/2041-210x.13617

Authors 10.1111/2041-210x.13617

Carlos Dominguez‐Carrió Jorge Fontes

Telmo Morato

Abstract

Abstract Deep‐sea exploration relies on cutting‐edge technology, which generally requires expensive instruments, highly specialized technicians and ship time. The increasing need to gather large‐scale data on the distribution and conservation status of deep‐sea benthic species and habitats could benefit from the availability of low‐cost imaging tools to facilitate the access to the deep sea world‐wide. Here we describe the Azor drift‐cam, a cost‐effective video platform designed to conduct rapid appraisals of deep‐sea benthic habitats. Built with off‐the‐shelf components, the Azor drift‐cam should be regarded as an effective, affordable, simple‐to‐assemble, easy‐to‐operate, resilient, operational and reliable tool to visually explore the deep sea to 1,000 m depth. Its performance was assessed during the MapGES_2019 cruise, where 135 successful dives between 100 and 800 m depth were carried out in 22 working days, providing over 100 hr of images for almost 80 km of seabed, mostly in areas that had never been explored before. The system does not aim to become a substitute for more sophisticated underwater video and photography platforms, such as ROVs, AUVs or manned submersibles. Rather, it aims to provide the means to perform quick assessments of deep‐sea benthic habitats in a simple and affordable manner. This drift‐cam system has the potential to make deep‐sea exploration more accessible, playing an important role in the Deep‐Ocean Observing Strategy and measuring some of the Essential Ocean Variables for deep‐sea monitoring and conservation strategies.

Predicting the distribution and abundance of abandoned, lost or discarded fishing gear (ALDFG) in the deep sea of the Azores (North Atlantic)

The Science of The Total Environment

Aug, 2023

9 team members are authors

OA Citations 19 Rising DOI 10.1016/j.scitotenv.2023.166579

Authors 10.1016/j.scitotenv.2023.166579

Emily M. Duncan Nina Vieira

José Manuel González‐Irusta

Carlos Dominguez‐Carrió

Telmo Morato

Marina Carreiro‐Silva Joachim Jakobsen Kirsten Jakobsen

Filipe M. Porteiro Nina Schläpfer Laura Herrera

Manuela Ramos

Yasmina Rodríguez João Pereira

Laurence Fauconnet

Luís Rodrigues Hugo Parra Christopher K. Pham

Abstract

Abandoned, lost, or discarded fishing gear (ALDFG), represents a significant percentage of the global plastic pollution, currently considered one of the major sources from sea-based activities. However, there is still limited understanding of the quantities of ALDFG present on the seafloor and their impacts. In this study, data on the presence of ALDFG was obtained from a large archive of seafloor video footage (351 dives) collected by different imaging platforms in the Azores region over 15 years (2006-2020). Most ALDFG items observed in the images relate to the local bottom longline fishery operating in the region, and include longlines but also anchors, weights, cables and buoys. A generalized additive mixed model (GAMM) was used to predict the distribution and abundance of ALDFG over the seafloor within the limits of the Azores Exclusive Economic Zone (EEZ) using a suite of environmental and anthropogenic variables. We estimated an average of 113 ± 310 items km^-2 (597 ± 756 per km^-2 above 1000 m depth), which could imply that over 20 million ALDFG items are present on the deep seafloor of the Azores EEZ. The resulting model identified potential hotspots of ALDFG along the seabed, some of them located over sensitive benthic habitats, such as specific seamounts. In addition, the interactions between ALDFG and benthic organisms were also analysed. Numerous entanglements were observed with several species of large anthozoans and sponges. The use of predictive distribution modelling for ALDFG should be regarded as a useful tool to support ecosystem-based management, which can provide indirect information about fishing pressure and allow the identification of potential high-risk areas. Additional knowledge about the sources, amounts, fates and impacts of ALDFG will be key to address the global issue of plastic pollution and the effects of fishing on marine ecosystems.

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