Beautiful, fragile and mystical corals become visible when modern methods are employed to map the ocean floor.
As recently as Saturday 21 June, a beautiful new coral colony was found 250 metres west of the subsea installation of Morvin. The corals were found at a depth of 360 metres in connection with the documentation of a reef.
“We want to have the best possible knowledge about the coral reefs so that we can avoid damaging them”. It is standard procedure in StatoilHydro to site installations outside the reefs, says Hovland.
StatoilHydro is gathering material about the ocean floor before it lays gas pipelines or other structures on the ocean floor. This is accomplished by a ROV (Remotely Operated Vehicle) equipped with searchlights and video camera.
FACTS
What is a coral?
- Polypus, or live coral, have an external skeleton of calcium.
- They live an dgrow with the aid of polyps that secrete calcium.
- Tropical coral like sunlight. On the other hand, deepwater coral thrive where it is dark and cold. They vary in size from a few millimetres to three metres.
- When the polypus dies, the calcium remains remain in place. Over the course of a year a coral reef can grow from a few millimetres to a couple of centimetres.
Ancient
Hovland discovered deepwater coral the first time in 1982 while surveying the ocean floor for the Snøhvit field in the Barents Sea. Since then the company has systematically surveyed coral reefs in connection with construction projects, particularly outside Mid-Norway.
Hovland and his colleagues have also discovered large coral reefs in the North Sea and the Norwegian Sea. Lying at depths of 250 to 450 metres, the oldest parts of the reefs are 8,500 years old.
Coral reefs on the Norwegian, Faroese and British continental shelves can grow up to 30 metres high and 200 metres in diameter. The reefs provide shelter for many species of animals. Scientists at the Institute of Marine Research in Bergen, with which Hovland works, have found up to 300 different species of animals in the reefs.
In Europe, deepwater corals can be found from the North Cape to Cadiz and in the Mediterranean. The US has deepwater corals on the Atlantic coast and in the Gulf of Mexico. They are also found on the bottom of the ocean outside Brazil and New Zealand.
