Croker carbonate slabs, Mid-Irish Sea
In May 2008 (18-27 May), a survey commissioned by JNCC undertook seabed habitat investigations of two Areas of Search (AoS) for offshore SACs. The objectives of this survey, within the Submarine structures in the mid-Irish Sea AoS and the Solan Bank AoS, were to acquire high quality acoustic data capable of identifying and delineating habitats listed under Annex I of the 1992 EC Habitats Directive; primarily the Annex I habitat Submarine structures made by leaking gases in the former AoS and Annex I Reef habitat in the latter AoS. Surveys consisted of both broad-scale and fine-scale acoustic techniques, utilising sidescan sonar and multibeam swathe bathymetry, along with a variety of ground-truthing techniques including towed and drop down video/stills and Hamon grab sampling. A Rock dredge was also used at a few stations in order to gather samples of epibiota from hard substrata to assist with the taxonomic identification of the video and still images. The range of sampling techniques employed ensured that any Annex I habitats could be adequately described and characterised. For both AoSs survey planning and interpretation of survey data utilised extensive pre-existing data sets. Additional information source: Whomersley, P., Wilson, C., Clements, A., Brown, C., Long, D., Leslie, A., Limpenny, D. 2010. Understanding the marine environment - seabed habitat investigations of Submarine Structures in the mid-Irish Sea and Solan Bank Area of Search (AoS). JNCC Report 430
dataset
http://data.jncc.gov.uk/data/15c033a9-9fc6-4f3d-afb3-642f9998e91c-GB001117.zip
name: GB001117.zip
15c033a9-9fc6-4f3d-afb3-642f9998e91c
eng
Whomersley, P., Wilson, C., Clements, A., Brown, C., Long, D., Leslie, A., Limpenny, D. 2010. Understanding the marine environment - seabed habitat investigations of Submarine Structures in the mid-Irish Sea and Solan Bank Area of Search (AoS). JNCC Report 430
biota
Marine
Seabed Habitats and Geology
GB001117
Corpulent
EUNIS
Confidence assessment required
Show on webGIS
Dredges
Drop camera
Grabs
Multibeam echo sounder
Side scan sonar
Towed video
-5.294621
-5.177528
53.570263
53.353367
2008-05-18
2008-05-27
publication
2008-05-01
Classification system details: EUNIS habitats and a separate Annex I layer. Survey technique details: Multibeam: Kongsberg EM3000D (at 300kHz); Sidescan: Benthos SIS 1624; 0.1m2 Hamon grab; rock dredge
Geospatial (vector polygon)
Unknown
Available under the Open Government Licence v3.0. Attribution statement: “Contains public sector data from © JNCC 2016. Contains public sector information, licensed under the Open Government Licence v3.0, from the Maritime and Coastguard Agency."
None
Digital and Data Solutions, JNCC
originator
Digital and Data Solutions, JNCC
pointOfContact
2018-06-14