We still have mysteries in Indian Ocean: BMKG

The Meteorology, Climatology, and Geophysics Agency (BMKG) launched expedition Indonesia PRIMA to the Indian Ocean for Nov 12-Dec 10, 2019, to further explore the less-identifiable depth of 70,560,000-square-kilometer waters, chairwoman Dwikorita Karnawati stated here, Monday.

"We still have several mysteries, black holes in the Indian Ocean," she remarked while adding that the expedition aimed at gaining a better understanding of the air-sea interaction in the Indian Ocean, mainly by utilizing a sonar-based multibeam echo sounder (MBS) tracking system.

Karnawati expounded that the device will facilitate researchers to study the Indian Ocean's bathymetry or the underwater profile in the seafloor. As a key factor of biological oceanography, the results of bathymetric surveys will enable researchers to measure the depth of a water body along with its underwater features.

The depth and seafloor's characteristics will further reveal information, one of which includes organisms inhabiting the seabed of the Indian Ocean.

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The Indonesia PRIMA expedition, an abbreviation of the Indonesia Program Initiative on Maritime Observation and Analysis, was a multi-year program established by Indonesia's BMKG and the Maryland-based the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA), an American scientific agency under the United States Department of Commerce.

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In addition to conducting research on Indian Ocean’s bathymetry, the expedition team was tasked with renewing some buoys or moorings in the waters. Buoy is a multi-purpose floating device that measures an entire range of weather variables, including wind speed, direction, and air and water temperature, as well as detects and launches an early warning system of tsunami.

The expedition team, comprising two NOAA marine experts, 12 BMKG researchers, three scholars, and four experts of the Assessment and Application of Technology Agency, will sail with a research vessel KR Baruna Jaya I for at least a month.

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