Integrated Russian-Vietnamese geological-geophysical and oceanographic expedition in the South China Sea (R/V “Akademik M.A. Lavrentyev”, cruise 88, 2019)
Keywords:
South China Sea, Vietnam, methane, gravimetry, magnetometry, sediments, mineral resources, bacteria, young scientistsAbstract
Integrated Russian-Vietnamese geological-geophysical and oceanographic expedition in the South China Sea (R/V “Akademik M.A. Lavrentyev”, cruise 88, 2019). R.B. SHAKIROV1, N.S. LEE1, A.I. OBZHIROV1, M.G. VALITOV1, V.T. SEDIN1, Yu.A. TELEGIN1, Z.N. PROSHKINA1, A.K. OKULOV1, A.V. STOROZHENKO1, M.V. IVANOV1, D.A. SHVALOV1, A.A. LEGKODIMOV1, A.I. ESKOVA1, N.A. LIPINSKAYA1, M.A. BOVSUN1,2, D.S. MAKSEEV1, V.Yu. KALGIN1, T.S. YAKIMOV1, NGUYEN TRUNG THANH3, LE DUC ANH3 (1V.I. Ilyichev Pacific Oceanological Institute, FEB RAS, Vladivostok, 2Far Eastern Federal University, Vladivostok, 3Institute of Marine Geology and Geophysics, Vietnam Academy of Science and Technology, Hanoi, Vietnam).
In November 2019, for the first time in 30 years, an integrated geological and geophysical joint expedition of the POI FEB RAS and the Vietnamese Academy of Science and Technology was carried out in the South China Sea (EEZ Vietnam) (88 cruise of the R/V “Akademik M.A. Lavrent’yev”). The set of methods consisted of geophysics, geology, hydroacoustics, gasgeochemistry, hydrooptics, geomicrobiology, paleogeography and hydrology. Gasgeochemical anomalies were found in the water column and bottom sediments, comparable with the anomalies over the oil and gas deposits along the Sea of Okhotsk shelf of Sakhalin Island. For the first time in the study area, deep water geomicrobiological indicators of hydrocarbon accumulations have been identified. The relief, geophysical fields, hydrological structure, features of sedimentation, paleogeography and mineralogy of the continental shelf of Vietnam and the adjacent deep sea basins are refined. Finely dispersed carbonate-clay sediments were proposed as a new mineral resource.
Areas that are promising for the search for new deposits of oil and gas, gashydrates, accumulations of iron-manganese
formations, and others are identified. Young scientists occupied more than 60 % of the scientific expedition staff.