Offshore staff
FLEET, UK – Sonardyne International and XOCEAN have completed a live seabed-to-shore data mission for Norske Shell on the Ormen Lange gas field in the Norwegian Sea.
The campaign involving use of an XOCEAN XO-450 unmanned surface vessel (USV) for A/S Norske Shell, was completed earlier this week without anyone having to travel offshore or from their home office, meeting current COVID-19 movement restrictions.
The USV assembled data from an array of Sonardyne’s Fetch pressure monitoring transponders: these had been deployed in 800-1,100 m (2,624-3,609 ft) water depth at the field last September to support a long-term seabed monitoring campaign.
In total the vessel transited in total 300 km (186 mi) from Kristiansund out to the field and back over three days.
After being dispatched to Norway the USV was launched by local marine operations service provider SafePath, and was then supervised or monitored remotely by Sonardyne specialists in the UK, XOCEAN’s USV pilots in Ireland, and Shell’s geophysicists in Norway and the US.
The Fetch transponders collect pressure, temperature and inclination data at the seafloor, at pre-programmed intervals. Using this data, any vertical displacement of the seabed can be calculated, Sonardyne explained, and Norske Shell will use the results to assist reservoir management.
For this mission, the XO-450 was also fitted with a Sonardyne acoustic transceiver beneath its hull.
04/24/2020
