HR: 1340h
AN: B13A-0175    [Abstracts]
TI: Preliminary Hydrothermal Heat Flow Measurements at the 9-10§ N East Pacific Rise
AU: * Ramondenc, P
EM: pierre.ramondenc@ce.gatech.edu
AF: School of Civil and Environmental Engineering, Georgia Institute of Technology, Atlanta, GA 30332-0355 United States
AU: Germanovich, L N
EM: leonid.germanovich@ce.gatech.edu
AF: School of Civil and Environmental Engineering, Georgia Institute of Technology, Atlanta, GA 30332-0355 United States
AU: Von Damm, K L
EM: kvd@eos.sr.unh.edu
AF: Complex Systems Research Center, EOS, University of New Hampshire, Durham, NH 03824-3525 United States
AU: Lowell, R P
EM: bob.lowell@eas.gatech.edu
AF: School of Earth and Atmospheric Sciences, Georgia Institute of Technology, Atlanta, GA 30332-0340 United States
AB: The March 2004 expedition at 9-10ø N East Pacific Rise, part of the RIDGE 2000 program, allowed amongst other things to pursue the monitoring and sampling of a number of vents after the volcanic eruptions that occurred in 1991/2. Earlier observations have shown that the chemical composition and the temperature have not yet stabilized at many of the vents. This expedition also gave us the opportunity to test an experimental device to estimate the velocity of diffuse flow and heat transport at a couple of vents. These experiments represent the first such attempts to measure these parameters for the 9-10ø N hydrothermal system. The idea was to focus the fluid flow through an opening and videotape the motion of particles composing the fluid. Though crude, this method should provide an upper estimate of the fluid velocity and the mass flux of the underlying upflow zone. This operation was also done at the same vents just with a scale maintained close to the flow. This approach yields a lower estimate of the velocity. These tests were run on three dives achieved with the deep submergence vehicle Alvin (dives # 3987, 3990 and 3992, respectively at M-vent, TICA-vent, Bio9, Bio9' and Bio9''). Typical results obtained for the total heat flux ranged from Q = 10^5 W to Q = 10^7 W. This experience has provided insight into a new design based on the temperature measurement at different regions in the stream. We hope to develop this new device in the coming months and deploy it in 2005.
DE: 3015 Heat flow (benthic) and hydrothermal processes
DE: 3035 Midocean ridge processes
DE: 3094 Instruments and techniques
DE: 3099 General or miscellaneous
SC: Biogeosciences [B]
MN: 2004 AGU Fall Meeting