Chikyu
Chikyū
|
|
| History | |
|---|---|
 Japan |
|
| Name: | Chikyū (地球; ちきゅう?) |
| Namesake: | Japanese word for "Earth" |
| Owner: | CDEX |
| Operator: | CDEX |
| Port of registry: |
Yokosuka
|
| Builder: | Mitsui Engineering & Shipbuilding and Mitsubishi Heavy Industries |
| Cost: | 60 billion yen |
| Laid down: | 25 April 2001 |
| Launched: | 18 January 2002 |
| Acquired: | 29 July 2005 |
| Homeport: | Yokosuka, Kanagawa |
| General characteristics | |
| Class and type: | NK (Nippon Kaiji Kyokai) |
| Type: | Ocean-going Drilling Vessel |
| Displacement: | 57,087 tons |
| Length: | 210 m (690 ft) |
| Beam: | 38 m (125 ft) |
| Height: | 130 m (430 ft) |
| Draft: | 9.2 m (30 ft) |
| Depth: | 16.2 m |
| Propulsion: |
|
| Speed: | 12 knots (22 km/h; 14 mph) |
| Range: | 14,800 nmi (27,400 km; 17,000 mi) |
| Complement: | 200 |
| Crew: | 100 |
Chikyū (地球; ちきゅう?) is a Japanese scientific drilling ship built for the Integrated Ocean Drilling Program (IODP). The vessel is designed to ultimately drill seven kilometres beneath the seabed, where the Earth's crust is much thinner, and into the Earth's mantle, deeper than any other hole drilled in the ocean thus far.
While the planned depth of the hole is significantly less than the Russian Kola Superdeep Borehole (which reached 12 kilometres (7.5 mi) depth on land), the scientific results are expected to be much more interesting since the regions targeted by Chikyū include some of the most seismically-active regions of the world. Other deep holes have been drilled by the drill ship JOIDES Resolution during the Deep Sea Drilling Project and the Ocean Drilling Program.
The Japanese part of the IODP program is called Chikyū Hakken (地球発見 Chikyū Hakken?), Japanese for "Earth Discovery". Chikyū is operated by the Centre for Deep Earth Research (CDEX), a subdivision of the Japan Agency for Marine-Earth Science and Technology (JAMSTEC). JAMSTEC also operates the DSV Shinkai, Earth Simulator supercomputer and other marine scientific research projects. CDEX is responsible for the services to support activities including on-board staffing, data management for core samples and logging; implements engineering site surveys; and conducts engineering developments. CDEX contracts with the Mantle Quest Japan Company for the navigation of the ship.
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