NWT RESEARCH DATABASE

Regions: Inuvialuit Settlement Region, Gwich'in Settlement Area

Tags: physical sciences, oceanography, monitoring, marine ecosystem, Beaufort Sea

Objective(s): To collect data on aspects the Beaufort shelf marine ecosystem.

Project Description: This licence has been issued for the scientific research application No.5042. The objective is continued annual collection of relevant data on aspects of the Beaufort shelf marine ecosystem. The activity in the Beaufort region is a brief mission at sea in the autumn of each year to recover and replace the observing system that acquires these data. The activities at home-base are mobilization for and de-mobilization from the annual mission, processing and analysis of each year’s data collections and preparation of informative data products for use by northern people, communities and management boards, for territorial and federal governments and for the private sector. The research team use specialized ocean-science instruments to monitor the marine ecosystem year-round without human interaction. The instruments, within watertight cylinders, have electronics to operate the sensors attached to them, small computers to manage data sampling, digital media for storing data, and batteries. For untended operation at sea, they are shackled onto an ‘oceanographic mooring’, basically a rope connecting submerged floats to an anchor at the seabed. To avoid loss to moving ice or stormy seas, no component of a mooring rises above 30-m depth. Moorings are deployed and recovered in collaboration with the Canadian Coast Guard, using Canadian Coast Guard Ship (CCGS) Sir Wilfrid Laurier. The CCG sends this light icebreaker annually to the Beaufort for a Western Arctic Patrol; it is used for science when homebound in the autumn. The ship is large enough to service moorings reliably and safely and provides dependable annual support to ocean monitoring. The work at each mooring site takes no more than two hours each year. Data that have been recorded during the year prior to recovery are returned to Department of Fisheries and Oceans (DFO’s) Institute of Ocean Sciences (Sidney, BC) for the processing required to extract ecosystem information. The complexity of processing and the large amount of data recorded each year require 6-12 months of effort to completion. The research team plan continued communication via channels used in past years: 1) annual brief summary reports to the Aurora Research Institute; 2) detailed annual DFO science cruise reports; 3) tri-annual State of Canada’s Arctic Seas reporting; 4) opportunistic science talks to the Fisheries Joint Management Committee (usually in Winnipeg); 4) opportunistic Marine Protected Area meetings (e.g. Anguniaqvia niqiqyuam Marine Protected Area monitoring plan); 5) occasional community visits; 6) occasional participation in northern science conferences (usually in Inuvik); and, 7) other opportunities that arise. The fieldwork for this study will be conducted from September 30, 2021 to October 30, 2021.