A team of Australian oceanographers has embarked on a ground-breaking 33‑day research voyage aboard research vessel (RV) Investigator, operated by CSIRO, Australia's national science agency.
The voyage aims to reveal the fine‑scale ocean processes that shape one of the world's most important marine environments: the Ningaloo Coast.
Ningaloo Reef's health is facing pressure from changes in ocean temperature and circulation. The ocean flows that connect Ningaloo Reef to the open ocean are important for maintaining the reef ecosystem's health yet are poorly understood.
Led by Professor Nicole Jones from The University of Western Australia School of Earth and Oceans and the UWA Oceans Institute, the voyage will deliver the most detailed measurements to date of submesoscale ocean currents.
These powerful but elusive flows occur at scales of 100 metres to 10 kilometres and play a critical role in transporting heat, nutrients, larvae, pollutants and other ocean‑borne materials from the ocean to the reef.
"Despite their importance, these currents have remained largely unobserved due to their small size and rapid evolution," Professor Jones said.
"Without RV Investigator's scientific capabilities, combined with novel real-time observation technologies, tracking these circulations through time is simply not possible."
The research team will track the currents' rapid evolution by combining fixed moored and floating instruments deployed from RV Investigator, onboard and towed instruments, and cutting‑edge satellite and airborne observations – including from a novel low‑altitude camera system mounted on a drone.
This multi‑platform approach will allow the team to map surface currents at unprecedented resolution and evaluate new remote‑sensing techniques designed to infer ocean flow from sea‑surface signatures.
Professor Jones said Ningaloo Reef – the world's largest fringing coral reef and a UNESCO World Heritage site – provided an ideal natural laboratory.
"Ningaloo sits at the intersection of the tropical and sub-tropical Indian Ocean where the warm poleward‑flowing Leeuwin Current interacts with strong equatorward winds and large surface and internal waves, to create energetic eddies," she said.
"These eddies are believed to inject nutrient‑rich water onto the shelf, sustaining the region's high biodiversity. By observing these dynamics in detail, we aim to quantify how nutrients are delivered to the reef and how submesoscale currents influence mixing, heat transport and ocean ecosystem health."
The voyage will directly support national needs in operational ocean forecasting, environmental management, search‑and‑rescue modelling and offshore industry planning.
The collaborative team includes an Indigenous Ranger from the WA Department of Biodiversity, Conservation and Attractions, academics from UWA, the Australian National University and the University of Tasmania, and ocean scientists from CSIRO and the Australian Institute of Marine Science. Importantly, the voyage will train the next generation of oceanographers, with four PhD students and two UWA Masters of Oceanography students participating.
Expected outcomes include new algorithms for estimating surface currents from satellites, prototype high‑resolution current maps for the Ningaloo region, open‑access mooring and ship‑based datasets, and improved physical parameterisations for next‑generation ocean and climate models.
Program Director with the CSIRO Marine National Facility, Andrew Martini, said the voyage would apply a wide range of RV Investigator's scientific capabilities and onboard expertise.
"With RV Investigator only recently back from Antarctica, this voyage demonstrates the impressive capabilities of both our nation's dedicated blue-water research vessel and CSIRO technical teams in delivering ocean research across Australia's vast marine estate," Mr Martini said.
"It will provide the scientific community with precise ocean data that simply could not be collected without access to a vessel like RV Investigator, generating vital information to improve our understanding and management of this globally significant region."
The voyage, which left Fremantle for Ningaloo this week, is supported by funding from the Australian Research Council and a grant of sea time on RV Investigator from the CSIRO Marine National Facility.
Image above shows the team at Fremantle shortly before departure. (L-R): Thivin Abeywickrama (UWA), Nicolas Mortimer (CSIRO), Bozena Wojtasiewicz (AIMS), Paul Branson (CSIRO), Tamara Schlosser (UTAS), Will Edge (UWA), Prashant Pujari (UWA), Michal Raczynski (UWA), Matt Rayson (UWA), Andrew Zulberti (UWA), Delilah Moncrieff (WA DBCA), Nicole Jones (UWA) and Sina Pinter (UWA). Credit: CSIRO-Max McGuire
Preview image: CSIRO research vessel (RV) Investigator. Credit: CSIRO
