Authors:

M. Roughan, V. Lago, S. Caon, M. Irwin I. Knuckey, S. Nicol, B. Nurnatis, C. Wickham, D. Wright

Knowledge of the three-dimensional structure and variabil­ity of ocean temperature is critical for understanding ocean circulation, heat uptake, marine extremes, all of which have a significant ecological impact on the abun­dance and distribution of marine life, with far reaching economic consequences. While satellite tech­nology offers near-global coverage of surface ocean tem­peratures, and Argo and XBT programs provide some subsurface observations, there are still substantial gaps, particularly in coastal regions where fisheries are most productive.

Building on the Moana Project in New Zealand the Australian FishSOOP program (Fishing Vessels as Ships of Opportunity) commenced an Australian trial in 2023, with an initial 17 vessels funded through FRDC and IMOS. Since then the FishSOOP fleet has grown to more than 50 vessels nationally, and nearly 30 vessels internationally (with COLTO and SPC), collecting temperature and pressure data across vast stretches of the Indo-Pacific. We are also collecting data with citizen scientists and first nations communities.

These new data are employed in many ways including: validating operational ocean forecasts, assimilated into regional ocean models to improve representation of the sub-mesoscale, being integrated with catch information on several fisheries projects, providing insights into the develop­ment of marine heatwaves throughout the water column and new understanding of how the East Australian Current interacts with shelf waters to produce nonuniform tempera­ture changes.  Some of these use cases will be shown. FishSOOP has provided a step-change in the amount of open access tem­perature data available as well as ocean information crit­ical to marine industries for operational decision making, showing the value of using fishing vessels to observe remote yet significant ocean regions.

Biography:

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