Advisory: Nation’s Most Advanced Seismic-Research Vessel To Be Dedicated in Galveston

EVENT: Dedication of the U.S. National Science Foundation's new flagship vessel for seismic research, the R/V Marcus G. Langseth.

WHEN: 4 p.m., Monday, Nov. 12.

WHERE: Pier 21, Port of Galveston, Galveston, Texas.

BACKGROUND: The academic community’s most advanced seismic-research vessel ever will be dedicated in Galveston Monday (Nov. 12), opening potential new windows on natural hazards, Earth’s evolution and Earth’s structure. The R/V Marcus G. Langseth, owned by the U.S. National Science Foundation (NSF), will be the nation’s flagship vessel for seismic research. It will generate CAT-scan-like 3D images of magma chambers, faults and other structures miles below the world’s seabeds.

Columbia University’s Lamont-Doherty Earth Observatory will operate the vessel for the National Science Foundation. Researchers from dozens of cooperating institutions will use the vessel, including scientists from the Institute for Geophysics at The University of Texas at Austin's Jackson School of Geosciences, who were the heaviest users of the Langseth's predecessor, the R/V Maurice Ewing.

Harm Van Avendonk from the institute will take part in the Langseth's first scientific mission in early 2008, working with researchers at the University of Wyoming to study subduction zones off the Pacific and Caribbean coasts of Costa Rica. Tom Shipley, a senior research scientist from the institute, led the committee of the University-National Oceanographic Laboratory System that oversaw outfitting the Langseth as a general purpose research vessel. A number of institute scientists will be present at the dedication.

Editors: A print-resolution photograph of the R/V Marcus G. Langseth can be downloaded at http://www.jsg.utexas.edu/images/enlarged/090907/01.html.

For more information on the R/V Langseth, contact Kevin Krajick, Columbia University, kkrajick@ei.columbia.edu, 212-854-9729 (office) or 917-361-7766 (mobile).

For more information about the Jackson School, contact J.B. Bird at jbird@jsg.utexas.edu, 512-232-9623.