Research News
This research voyage ended under palm trees in Costa Rica. Yet prior to that, the scientists had worked at sea in shifts seven days a week for two months. Photo: S. Kutterolf, GEOMAR
Further Information:
Press release of the GEOMAR (in German)
Reports from aboard the JOIDES
Blog of the researchers (in German)
The "Integrated Ocean Drilling Program"
Press Release of the GEOMAR (in German)
Background information to the Integrated Ocean Drilling Program (IODP):
The Integrated Ocean Drilling Program (IODP) is an international marine research program that explores Earth's history and structure recorded in seafloor sediments and rocks, and monitors subseafloor environments. IODP builds upon the earlier successes of the Deep Sea Drilling Project (DSDP) and Ocean Drilling Program (ODP), which revolutionized our view of Earth history and global processes through ocean basin exploration. IODP greatly expands the reach of these previous programs by using multiple drilling platforms, including riser, riserless, and mission-specific, to achieve its scientific goals.
Drilling Deep to Understand Earth
For two months, scientists from the GEOMAR Helmholtz Centre for Ocean Research Kiel travelled on the American drilling ship JOIDES Resolution off the west coast of Costa Rica. In this seismically highly active region, they researched the mechanisms triggering earthquakes and volcanism. A few days ago, they returned from their voyage. The drilling ship JOIDES Resolution, one of the world's largest research vessels, travels the oceans all around the globe in its quest of finding out more about the Earth's outer mantle and the processes within. The international expedition ran from 23 October to 11 December 2012 and included also three GEOMAR scientists. The researchers drilled along so-called subduction zones. These are areas where the oceanic crust of the Earth slides underneath the continental crust. The project, for which GEOMAR researchers Dr Steffen Kutterolf, Dr Michael Stipp and Dr Ken Heydolph collected samples during their trip, is called "Costa Rica Seismogenesis Project" or CRISP, for short. In 2002, the target area experienced a major earthquake. Because of the many preliminary investigations the Kiel-based scientists had previously conducted in the area, the researchers were able to assess the best drilling locations. Hence, the voyage proved successful: The borings and multi-disciplinary co-operation provided the researchers with new insights regarding the development of and changes to the subduction zone over time. Potentially, the results could contribute also to an improved understanding of earthquakes in other regions of the Earth. For instance, the devastating earthquake off the Japanese coast on 11 March 2011 occurred in a subduction zone with a structure similar to the one off Costa Rica.
"So far, other types of subduction zones were considered much more dangerous", says Stipp, "clearly, we need to correct some models describing the onset of earthquakes." The expedition involved 33 scientists from ten nations. It served in preparation of the CRISP project's highlight: drilling five kilometres deep into the seismogenic layer.
