The ShoreZone survey confirmed that much of the shoreline of the island is open to full power of waves from the fetch across the Bering Sea, making high energy and dynamic shores on all the outer coasts. Shore types include soaring rock cliffs rising straight up from the sea to over 600 metres, low cliffs of columnar basalt from old lava flows and 100s of kilometres of barrier sand beaches and backshore lagoons with internal recurved spits. All combinations of wave exposure and shore types, from the most mobile sediment beaches at highest wave energy to the very protected shallow water within the backshore lagoons are present on the Island, making the coastline dynamic and spatial complex. Attached biota were observed on the rocky shorelines, and deep piles of drift seaweed along the south-side of the island indicated there is likely a rich complex of benthic life there in the shallow nearshore subtidal waters. Shore fast sea ice surrounds the island for many months of the year and limits the distribution of attached biota in the intertidal zone. The upland areas of the island are treeless arctic landscape, with a marshy network of thaw melt ponds and tundra, between volcanic cinder cones and bare bedrock outcrops. Land base is less than half the size of Vancouver Island.
Month: May 2021
This pilot project is a joint effort by Archipelago, Marine Instruments and Marine Instruments local dealer in France, ISIFISH. Following reports of dolphin bycatch in gillnet fisheries in the Bay of Biscay, the French government commissioned a demonstration EM project to assess the data collection capabilities on these small vessels. A new MarineObserve EM system manufactured by Marine Instruments capable of transmitting live video and sensor data over 4G from the vessel was installed on four gillnet vessels, with the associated cameras and sensors. No changes were required to either fishing activities or catch handling and the privacy of the fishermen involved was maintained in the video collected using advanced techniques. All data analysis is done locally in France by the project holder, SINAY, using Archipelago’s EM Interpret TM (EMI) analysis software and training. The initial project will run for 5 months and based on successful data collection to meet monitoring goals there is the expectation of a one-year extension.
