VISIONS'05

The VISIONS '05 expedition was a highly interdisciplinary, complex cruise focused on the Endeavour Segment of the Juan de Fuca Ridge and the accretionary margin near the intersection of the Nootka Transform Fault and subduction zone off the west coast of Vancouver Island. The project was funded through the National Science Foundation, the W.M. Keck Foundation, the University of Washington, WHOI, NOAA, and NEPTUNE Canada

The cruise was highly successful despite days lost to weather and equipment problems.

• The first live transmission of high definition video imagery from the seafloor and completion of three broadcasts. The transmission was streamed from the R/V Thompson over the Galaxy 10R Satellite to the University of Washington (UW) campus. From the UW, imagery were seamlessly transmitted over Internet 2 and streamed as high definition imagery across the US, Canada, Australia and Tokyo.
• Intense field operations that resulted in recovery and redeployment of an extensive suite of instruments along the Endeavour Segment, sampling of water, sulfides and microorganisms in three of the five fields; recovery of all instruments from the Keck proto-Neptune observatory at the Nootka study area.
• The first use of an underwater “lightpost” that allowed stunning HD imagery to be taken of large
• sulfide structures.
• Completion of a very high resolution map (~ 5 m) of the Endeavour Segment using the
• autonomous vehicle ABE and SM2000 sonar system.
• The first ABE dives concomitant with Jason 2 operations, allowing extremely efficient ship use.
• Continuation of the REVEL program, which included 5 new REVEL teachers and 2 mentors.