ORION site discussion forum reopened

In addition to the recently announced RCL forum, the MARGINS community online forum to discuss the merits of either Mariana or Central Amierica as an ORION Global Ocean Observatory site has been reopened. This forum will provide the substance of a recommendation to the ORION Science and technology Advisory Committee regarding which site provides the greatest scientific and technical opportunities for an ORION deployment.

ORION and the Ocean Observatories Initiative will constitute a major Advance in real-time buoyed and seabed ocean monitoring. An exciting opportunity for the MARGINS community comes from the Global Ocean Observatories that will be distributed where long-term monitoring can most effectively address interdisciplinary geophysical, chemical and biological
questions.

Preliminary arguments for how a cabled Global Ocean Observatory might be scientifically advantageous and logically constructed at either Mariana or Central America were submitted to ORION by groups headed by Patty Fryer and Kevin Brown. As a result, at the April 2006 ORION Program Design and Implementation Workshop (http://www.orionprogram.org/di_workshop.html) it was recommended that infrastructure deployment include a buoyed observatory at one of the proposed MARGINS subduction zone sites.

The ORION Science and Technology Advisory Committee (STAC) subsequently requested prioritization of one or other proposed site by the MARGINS community. A subcommittee of MARGINS Steering Committee members with no vested interest in either site was established, and the MARGINS Office ran an online community forum for discussion of the issues at hand. The preliminary report sent to STAC by the MARGINS subcommittee is included in reference documents in the forum. A final recommendation will be made at a late summer MARGINS Steering Committee meeting.

http://www.nsf-margins.org/webforum/
Username: guest
Password: forum

This forum will facilitate community input to the MSC on the merits of the two proposed sites. As well as new discussions, the forum hosts background documents and earlier discussion points. The forum will close permanently at 4:30 pm Central Time, August 28, 2006, after which time the MARGINS subcommittee will make its final recommendations to ORION STAC.

Note: You may be asked to enter the username and password more than once to gain access to the forum.