SSV Robert C Seamans

SEA’s newest vessel was designed by Laurent Giles of Hampshire England, and built at JM Martinac shipbuilding in Tacoma, Washington. Named after former trustee and Chairman of SEA’s board, the Robert C. Seamans is a 134-foot steel brigantine and is the most sophisticated oceanographic research/sailing school vessel ever built in the United States. Improvements in design and equipment, including a wet/dry laboratory and larger library, classroom, and computer laboratory, enhance the SEA academic program.

SEA vessels fly the United States flag and are inspected and certified by the United States Coast Guard as Sailing School Vessels (SSV). Sailing School Vessels are required to meet stringent safety standards that differ from those of a passenger vessel on a comparable route. All SEA vessels meet or exceed the safety requirements for their class.

Winches
Markey DESH-4 Electric Hydrographic Winch with 3000-5000m ¼” 3×19 wire rope
Bathythermograph Winches with 1/8” wire rope
Hydraulic j-frames
Dynacon sheave with payout metering, speed and tensioning capability, LCI-90 display

Bathymetric Equipment
Knudsen Model 3260 Chirp sub-bottom profiling systems (2-7 kHz) with TR-109 transducers)

Physical/Chemical Oceanographic Equipment
Water sampling Carousel SBE 32SC capable of carrying the following instrumentation package:

• Seabird Electronics (SBE) 90208 Auto Fire Module
• SBE “SeaCAT” Conductivity, Temperature and Depth (CTD) Profiler
• Biospherical PAR sensor
• Sea Point in-vivo chlorophyll-a Fluorometer
• Wetlabs CDOM Fluorometer and Transmissometer
• SBE-43 oxygen sensor
• 12 x 2.5-L Niskin Water Sampling Bottles

Acoustic Doppler Current Profiler (RDI Ocean Surveyor 75kHz)
Octans fiber optic gyro-compass (CC); Ashtech ADU-5 (RCS)
RBR XR420 towed CTD
YSI-30 and YSI-85 handheld meters
Orion 3-star benchtop pH meter
Ocean Optics Flame spectrophotometers with DH-mini light sources
Secchi Disk
Star-Oddi centi-TD (temperature/depth) loggers for depth readings on towed net deployments
Full complement of wet-chemical capability (e.gt., column reductions, filtration, etc)

Geological Sampling Equipment
Shipek Sediment Grab
Gravity Corer

Microscopes
Zeiss Stemi 305 Stereo Dissecting Microscopes
Zeiss Axiolab A1 LED Fluorescence Mircroscopes
Zeiss Axiocam microscope camera for digital photomicrographics

Datalogging
Underway clean-flowing seawater system with SBE-45 thermosalinograph, in-vivo chlorophyll and CDOM fluorometer, and transmissometer. System logs surface seawater salinity, temperature, in-vivo chlorophyll fluorescence, beam attenuation, CDOM fluorescence, as well as GPS position once per minute while underway.

Computers / Network
HP rp5700 (Windows 7; 2-4GB RAM) and Intel NUCi3 solid-state (Windows 10; 8GB RAM) Desktops for scientific instruments as well as shipboard navigation and communication equipment, SCS for data acquisition and logging, LAN and wireless network, Synology RS816 rack station network storage device, automatic data backup, student library with HP rp5700 Desktops, Intel I-NUC solid-state computer, printers, and Dell and Lenovo laptops.

Other
Laboratory equipment (centrifuges, adjustable micropipettes, etc.), Milli-Q DirectQ3, aquaria, PAR reference sensor, hydrophone and recorder, PCR thermocycler, electrophoresis gel rig

Biological Sampling Equipment
Aquabotix Hydroview ROV (200ft rating, color cameras and HD ideo)
Turner Designs Model 10-AU Benchtop Fluorometers
Sea-Gear 200, 335, 1000 μm mesh Plankton nets
Sea-Gear 335 μm mesh Neuston nets (1m wide by 0.5m high)
Sea-Gear 63 μm Phytoplankton nets
Tucker Trawl multiple opening/closing net
McLane Large Volume Water Transfer System (WTS-LV) (CC)
Phantom 3 Pro UAV Quadcopter for aerial observations