German Marine Research

A rare summit meeting at sea

The research vessel "Meteor" encounters the research icebreaker "Polarstern" on her way to the Antarctic, at the equator during an expedition on climate research in the tropical Atlantic Ocean .

It is the sailors, the captains and their crews that form the backbone of German marine research. Their knowledge, their experience, their sense for the ocean.

They steer the research vessels safely across the oceans, and always give us a piece of home at sea during the expeditions. They enable missions that serve research, without which we could not explore the ocean. It's their job - and yet they deserve our thanks. Acting on this thank you . . .

POLARSTERN captain Thomas Wunderlich

POLARSTERN captain Moritz Langhinrichs

POLARSTERN captain Stefan Schwarze

METEOR captain Rainer Hammacher

On board "Meteor", the ROV MARUM-SQUID 2000, from the high-tech lab at MARUM in Bremen, awaits its deployment.

This ROV can work in water depths of up to 2,000 meters and is used on this "Meteor" cruise in the shelf areas around South Georgia.

The water sampling rosette – a standard device of marine researchers.

"Meteor" on an expedition in the tropical Atlantic. The tropical oceans play a key role in global climate variability.

Chief Scientist Peter Brandt, Professor of Experimental Oceanography at the GEOMAR Helmholtz Center for Ocean Research, Kiel, during an expedition off the coast of West Africa.

Cold, nutrient-rich water from the depths reaches the sea surface, here in the upwelling areas off the coast. "We are investigating if and how the currents and properties of water masses, such as temperature, salinity and oxygen, will change, and what impact these changes will have on climate or biological productivity and fishing off the West African coast."

For West African countries, these data are of great importance, since fishing is often the main source of food and income.

"But the data are also important because global climate models for this part of the world’s oceans still have significant gaps. So if we want to make reliable climate predictions, we need observational programs that provide us with high-resolution, long-term data," said Brandt.

The scientists deploy "Glider", small measuring robots that, once programmed, fly through the ocean on their own and send all the data they collect to the scientists' home computers via satellite.

In order to deploy the gliders, the scientists and members of the crew have to leave the ship and take a rubber dinghy to a previously determined position.

"Scanfish" test in the experimental tank aboard "Meteor". The device is utilized for complex oceanographic measurements. The “Scanfish” is equipped with a central control unit and several sensors, which measure temperature, pressure, salinity, oxygen, as well as chlorophyll and turbidity. The data are recorded online. Data transmission and power supply are carried through the tow cable.

The dynamics of the ocean is the focus of this expedition. The oceanographers are looking for turbulence, internal waves, to understand how layers of water merge, and in the vastness of the ocean they can even detect tiny water vortices of only a few centimeters.

They need high-tech equipment that can be deployed for weeks, months or even up to one year, for a measurement series. These measuring instruments are stationary, anchored to the seafloor with steel cables up to several thousand meters long, and kept in the water column by buoyant floats. Here, they are taking one of these anchorages back aboard.

In the laboratory on board "Meteor", the oxygen concentration of the water samples is measured.

Learning from and with each other: The "Meteor" expedition in the Atlantic off the west coast of Africa should also strengthen German-African cooperation. Chief Scientist Peter Brandt has invited scientists from the African partner institutes to take part in the research cruise.

Great media interest in Luanda, Angola

Together with the German Ambassador, Chief Scientist Peter Brandt answers questions from journalists. In the evening, there will be a reception on board, with the Minister of Fisheries Ms. Victoria de Barros, thanking the German Government for their support in the exploration of the Angolan marine ecosystem. In her speech, she also emphasizes that climate change poses a huge challenge to Angola's socio-economic development. In recent years, the marine ecosystem has been confronted with the consequences of the El Niño phenomenon and a global increase in temperature.

METEOR captain Rainer Hammacher and the Angolan pilot. After the stay in Luanda, the research cruise continues to the upwelling areas off Namibia. After five weeks at sea, the expedition ends in Walvis Bay.

The good old "Meteor" continues to steam to unlock the secrets of the ocean so that we all better understand our world.

On the 30th anniversary of the ship in 2016, we asked Captain Rainer Hammacher whether 30 years are old or young for a research vessel.

His answer: "The Meteor is still an impressive research platform. A ship with a history rich in tradition, which represents Germany and its excellent marine research outstandingly all over the world".

It is the 50th cruise of the research vessel "Maria S. Merian". A jubilee trip with a tight work program: After the expedition began under heavy snowfall in Bremerhaven, the route leads to the Kattegat from the North Sea through the Skagerrak.

Among other things, this expedition investigates how winter looks on the seafloor. "What happens in winter in the boundary layer between sediment and water is actually largely unknown. The samples and data we collect on this trip are therefore particularly valuable. Their evaluation will contribute significantly to our understanding of the material flows in North and Baltic Sea," said the chief scientist and IOW Director Prof. Dr. Ulrich Bathmann.

The physicists’ winch is iced. For months, oceanographers have been preparing to use their microstructure probe, but now the orange kevlar line, which has the sensitive gauge attached to it, cannot move, forward or backwards. The boatswain has a simple but vital idea: Thaw the winch with warm water.

Sometimes it is just these small, but clever ideas that determine the success of an expedition, even on a high-tech ship like the "Maria S. Merian", one of the most powerful research platforms at sea.

At 31 stations, the marine researchers of the Leibniz Institute for Baltic Sea Research Warnemünde (IOW) deploy their measuring equipment even in force 9 winds and freezing temperatures, working hand-in-hand with the ship's crew.

In her speech, German Chancellor Angela Merkel praised the ship as a "floating marvel" and "new star in the research sky.

The Chancellor said: "The English physicist Isaac Newton once said: ‘What we know is a drop, what we don't know is an ocean.’ The human thirst for knowledge will thus always remain insatiable. And yet we have every reason to rejoice that with “Sonne” a new star - to also claim the sky over the oceans - has risen in the research firmament.

We hope that "Sonne" will help us to understand what is going on in the dark depths of the ocean, and what that means to mankind. That's why I say today: All my good wishes accompany "Sonne", her team, and the scientists on their research cruises. May they bring home many insights to the benefit of all of us."

With a length of 116 meters, "Sonne" belongs to the large ships in the German research fleet. The “Sonne” is mainly used in the Pacific and Indian Oceans.