For this second campaign, Warmalis 2, the scientific team aboard the Alis, including Martine Rodier (MIO-EMBIO), is crossing the central Pacific Ocean from south to north, starting from Papeete in French Polynesia and heading north across the Kiribati Line Islands to finish its work in international waters. Having begun on 14 September, the campaign will last 21 days, during which 15 sampling stations will be carried out, weather conditions permitting. This campaign has the distinction of being the very last for the Alis, a vessel in the French oceanographic fleet. After more than 30 years of loyal service, the Alis will be retiring at the end of this mission.
Warmalis aims to understand the functioning of the pelagic ocean ecosystem and determine its influence on tuna resources in the western and central Pacific.
Scientists will be studying the intermediate trophic levels (zooplankton and micronekton) of the large pelagic ecosystems of the Pacific, which account for more than 50% of the world's tuna catches. Zooplankton and micronekton are elements that link the physical/chemical factors of the ocean, which influence their distribution and abundance, to the megafauna (e.g. tuna, marine mammals, seabirds) that are their predators.
The aim of the Warmalis project is to fill the major gap in knowledge about the large pelagic ecosystems of the Pacific. The aim is to provide scientific knowledge for the sustainable management of pelagic resources by understanding how pelagic ecosystems function (from the physical level to intermediate biological levels) and by collecting observations to validate and improve the ecosystem models used to analyse tuna resources (SEAPODYM).
The Warmalis campaigns are multidisciplinary, collecting physico-chemical data on seawater as well as data on zooplankton and micronekton. To characterise physico-chemical conditions and primary production, scientists will measure temperature, salinity, oxygen, fluorescence, light, currents, nutrients, photosynthetic pigments, phytoplankton abundance, primary production and phytoplankton communities. Secondary production (zooplankton, micronekton) will be measured by acoustic sampling (TAPS, WBAT, S-ADCP, EK60) and netting for zooplankton and micronekton.