As part of the Department of Trade and Industry's (now Department of Energy and Climate Change) 1999 Strategic Environmental Assessment SEA1 (White Zone) Environmental Survey: Seabed survey of the deep-waters to the north and west of Scotland.
The aims were to : Complete TOBI sidescan sonar survey of the "White Zone" begun on RRS Charles Darwin cruise 119C leg A; To carry out photographic surveys of the "White Zone" to ground truth the sidescan sonar imagery and provide an assessment of the seabed fauna; To carry out seabed sampling to further ground truth the sidescan sonar imagery and generate samples for the future analysis of selected environmental parameters (hydrocarbons, elements, particle size).
39 samples were collected. Raw TOBI Bathymetry - includes sidescan sonar, sub-bottom profiler and magnetometer data and Mosaiced TOBI sidescan imagery are available.
The survey report is also available.
The preliminary report describes the data collection and interpretation carried out by Southampton Oceanography Centre in the summer of 1999 on behalf of the DTI. The areas surveyed were in unlicensed parts of the UKCS NW of Scotland, and the purpose of the work was to obtain regional environmental information. The work was carried out in two survey legs, Leg A was a regional side-scan sonar survey, whilst leg B was a seafloor survey of targets selected from the results of leg 1. This report is presented in 4 sections: Section 1 - Cruise report for Leg A; Section 2 - Cruise report for Leg B; Section 3 - Regional environmental interpretation from side-scan sonar and camera data; Section 4 - Initial environmental assessment.