Vessel, instrumentation and acquisition

The Urania Research vessel is an oceanographic ship certified for the Mediterranean and in all oceanic waters apart from polar areas. The ship is equipped for geophysical and oceanographic purposes.

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Figure 4: Left: Urania R/V in the Naples harbour before sailing for the Atlantic, October 18, 2005 and right: in Funchal (Madeira) on November, 3, 2005.

During the cruise the following equipment was employed:

• DGPS positioning: Omnistar, Fugro
• Multibeam echosounder Reson 8160
• Gyro-compass: SGBrown as Velocity Reference Unit (VRU)
• CTD: SeaBird
• Chirp Sub-bottom profiler: Datasonics CAP6600
• EG&G Geometrics proton magnetometer EG & G 811/13
• Single-beam analogic echo-sounder: Atlas Deso 25
• Monochannel seismic acquisition system (sparker source, 8 hydrophones GeoResources streamer).

The following softwares were used during acquisition and data pre- processing on board:

• Multibeam data acquisition/processing PDS 2000 ©(Thales- Geosolutions, Fugro)
• Multibeam processing software CARIS HIPS ©
• Side-scan-sonar acquisition and rendering software ISIS ©
• Seismic/sub-bottom acquisition software SwanPro©(Communication Technology, Ltd.Cesena, Italy)
• Seismic processing freeware SeisPro (L. Gasperini, ISMAR-CNR, Bologna, Italy)
• Generic Mapping Tool, GMT freeware, 4.0 Release (Wessel and Smith, 1995)

Table 4: Urania R/V technical specifications

Length OA (m)	61,30
Length BP (m)	52,50
Beam (m)	11,10
Draft (m)	4,00 (5,40 with echo-sounder)
Machinery	2x1360 BHP MAK (1000kWX2)
Cruise speed	10 Kn
Gross tonnage	1115 T
Lightweight (water displacement)	1300 M/T
Autonomy (at 9 Kn)3t/day	30 days
Fresh water capacity	130 T
Fuel oil capacity	250 T
Classe	* 100-A-1.1-Nav. IL; st
Navigazione	Int. Lunga
Port of Registry and number	N 275 Napoli, Italia,International Registry
Identification (international)	9013220
Radar	Koden MDC 1810/P/Koden MD 3320S
Echo-sounder	Koden CVS 832
Transreceiver SSB	Skanti HF SSB TRP 8000
Magnetic Compass	Cassens e Plath NR. 2
Auto-pilot	Microtecnica Supernauta
Gyrocompass	Microtecnica Polaris MK2 NR.2
GPS 1	1) Koden KGP 900; 2)
GPS 2	JRC NWZ 4570
GPS Differential	Fugro Omni Star
Multibeam echo-sounder	Reson SeaBat 8160, 50KHz
ADCP (Doppler currentmeter)	RDI 4 beams transducer 300 KHz
ADCP (Doppler currentmeter)	RDI Ocean Surveyor 75 KHz
Single-beam echo-sounder	1) Atlas DESO 25 12-33KHz; 2) Atlas DESO 25 100-210 KHz;
Sub-bottom profilerhull mounted	CAP6600, Datasonics 3-7 kHz
Side Scan Sonar	Edgetech DF1000, 2 channels 100-500 KHz
Meteo-station	AANDERAA 3015