Eos, Vol. 91, No. 43, 26 October 2010
Volume 91
number 43
26 OCTOBER 2010
EOS, Transactions, American Geophysical Union
pages 393–404
Ocean Drilling: Forty Years
of International Collaboration
future scientific and operational goals
of ocean drilling but also lends insight
into how to manage and operate other
broad and long-term international science
endeavors.
PAGES 393–394
International cooperation is an essential
component of modern scientific research
and societal advancement [see ­Ismail-​­Zadeh
and Beer, 2009], and scientific ocean drilling
represents one of Earth science’s longestrunning and most successful international
collaborations. The strength of this
collaboration and its continued success result
from the realization that scientific ocean
drilling provides a unique and powerful tool
to study the critical processes of both shortterm change and the long-term evolution of
Earth systems. A record of Earth’s changing
tectonics, climate, ocean circulation, and
biota is preserved in marine sedimentary
deposits and the underlying basement rocks.
And because the ocean floor is the natural
site for accumulation and preservation
of geological materials, it may preserve a
continuous record of these processes.
The challenge lies in accessing these
records. It was recognized early on that no
single country could support such a large
effort on the decadal time scale needed.
Thus, those planning drilling efforts quickly
realized that international resources and
commitment are necessary to mounting
a significant investigation of the records
preserved beneath the oceans on the global
scale required. An international program
also allows countries that make more limited
financial contributions to utilize the full
resources provided by the large program
and make significant scientific contributions.
Begun in the late 1960s, this large program
has had different names throughout its
history: the Deep Sea Drilling Program
(DSDP), the Ocean Drilling Program
(ODP), and its current iteration, the
Integrated Ocean Drilling Program (IODP).
In the current program, geoscientists and
microbiologists from 24 member countries
participate in drilling expeditions on three
platforms (see Figure 1): a riser drilling
vessel supplied by Japan, a nonriser drilling
vessel provided by the United States, and
alternative platforms for ­high-​­latitude and
By D. K. Smith, N. E xon, F. J. A. S. Barriga,
and Y. Tatsumi
s­ hallow-​­water drilling provided by the
European Consortium for Ocean Research
Drilling (­ECORD).
Tracing the history and the evolving
structure of coordinated effort for scientific
ocean drilling reveals how this international
program has lasted for more than 40 years.
Such reflection not only helps to delineate
Brief History of Scientific Ocean Drilling
From 1968 until 1983, the U.S. National
Science Foundation (NSF) provided the
drilling vessel (D/V) Glomar Challenger
for scientific ocean drilling research, and
ocean drilling began playing a major role
in the study of Earth systems. The ship
Fig. 1.Three scientific ocean drilling platforms of the Integrated Ocean Drilling Program (IODP)
are shown. (a) The riser-equipped D/V Chikyu, operated by Japan, is shown sailing in Tokyo
Bay (photo courtesy of the Japan Agency for Marine-Earth Science and Technology and IODP).
(b) The D/V JOIDES Resolution, operated by the United States, is offshore Honolulu (photo
courtesy of Texas A&M University). (c) The Russian icebreaker Sovetskiy Soyuz, operated by
the European Consortium for Ocean Research Drilling (ECORD), provides support for mission-­
specific platform drilling in the Arctic Ocean (photo courtesy of Murmansk Shipping Company).
Eos, Vol. 91, No. 43, 26 October 2010
was managed through the DSDP. Scientific
planning for expeditions was done under
the guidance of the Joint Oceanographic
Institutions for Deep Earth Sampling
(­JOIDES) advisory group, which consisted
of more than 200 scientists from academic
institutions, government agencies, and
private industry from all over the world. The
International Phase of Ocean Drilling (IPOD)
began in 1975, and research was conducted
with international funds. Scientists from
the United States were joined at sea on the
D/V Glomar Challenger by scientists from
Germany, Japan, the United Kingdom, the
Soviet Union, and elsewhere (http://​w ww​
.­deepseadrilling​.org/​­about​.htm).
DSDP/IPOD was the exploration phase
of ocean drilling, with holes being drilled
in most parts of the world’s oceans to
test existing ideas on the formation and
evolution of the ocean basins and also
satisfy curiosity on what would be found in
places never before explored. This phase
yielded important scientific advances
including contributing greatly to the concept
of plate tectonics; proving that oceanic
rocks are subducted at oceanic trenches
and are all less than 200 million years old
and thus much younger than the oldest
continental rocks; and providing a detailed
history of the climate and oceanographic
changes that have affected the world’s
oceans in the past 200 million years.
When the D/V Glomar Challenger was
reaching retirement, in the early 1980s,
the science community convened the first
international conference on scientific ocean
drilling. At this meeting the international
science community defined the importance
of ocean drilling and identified the scientific
research that could not be completed
without a long-term, internationally
supported, worldwide ocean drilling
program. NSF agreed to provide a new
vessel to the international community. That
vessel was the D/V JOIDES Resolution.
ODP, the successor program to the
DSDP, began in 1983. ODP was funded
by the NSF and 22 international partners
(http://​w ww​.­odplegacy​.org/​­program​
_­admin/​­default​.html). JOIDES continued
to provide guidance on scientific planning
through a science advisory structure whose
committee members were drawn from
the international community. ODP was a
phase of ocean drilling that aimed to solve
global scientific problems. The scientific
accomplishments of this period are many
and cover a wide spectrum of topics. ODP
defined the history of sea level rise and
documented periods of extreme climate.
Drilling extended a record depth (>1800
meters) into the oceanic crust to define
crustal structure, which was previously
understood only from ophiolites, sections
of ocean crust that have been uplifted and
exposed on land. Drill samples provided
evidence for a subseafloor biosphere
extending to depths of at least 800 meters
below the seafloor. Drilling also yielded
basic information on fluid flow and gas
hydrate formation in deep ocean sediments,
important for possible future hydrocarbon
exploration. Further, drilling revealed the
size and internal structure of a massive,
active sulfide deposit and its underlying
stockwork forming at a water depth of 3650
meters, important for understanding the
formation of metal ore bodies within these
deep-water deposits. Numerous additional
scientific accomplishments are described at
http://​w ww​.­odplegacy​.org/​­science​_­results/​
­highlights​.html.
IODP: The Current Phase
of Scientific Ocean Drilling
Before the IODP began, a number of
international scientific workshops were held
from which three main research themes
were identified as crucial to gaining a
deeper understanding of Earth processes
and achievable through coordinated drilling
efforts. These were (1) Environmental
change, processes and effects, which deals
with past rapid climate change and extreme
climates, climatic cycles, and the evolution
of oceanic currents and boundaries;
(2) Solid Earth cycles and geodynamics,
which deals with continental breakup and
sedimentary basin formation, large igneous
provinces, drilling to Earth’s mantle, and
understanding earthquakes and tsunamis;
and (3) The deep biosphere and the ocean
floor, which covers understanding the
biomass found deep beneath the seafloor
and the accumulations of frozen gas
hydrates (see http://​w ww​.iodp​.org/​isp).
In concert with the science planning for
the IODP, an International Working Group
(IWG) made up of funding partners worked
to define the structure of the program that
would support the three science objectives.
A main goal of the IWG was to provide
increased drilling capability to the program.
This was accomplished by the United States
providing the newly refitted D/V JOIDES
Resolution; Japan providing the ­riser-​
­equipped vessel D/V Chikyu, which can drill
much deeper than the JOIDES Resolution
and opens up drilling opportunities in places
not possible for riserless vessels because of
safety and pollution concerns; and ECORD
providing ­mission-​­specific platforms for
drilling in s­ hallow-​­water environments and ​
ice-​­covered areas (Figure 1).
An implementing organization is
responsible for the operation of each of the
drilling platforms. The U.S. Implementing
Organization operates the D/V JOIDES
Resolution; the Japan Agency for ­Marine-​
­Earth Science and Technology (JAMSTEC)
Center for Deep Earth Exploration operates
the ­r iser- ​­equipped vessel, D/V Chikyu; and
the ECORD Science Operator operates
­mission- ​­specific platforms. Platform
operating costs come from the agency
supplying the platform capability.
Currently, 24 countries are members
of the IODP. NSF and Japan’s Ministry
of Education, Culture, Sports, Science
and Technology (MEXT) are the lead
agencies for IODP. ­ECORD, a consortium
of 17 countries, is a contributing member.
The Ministry of Science and Technology
of the People’s Republic of China, the
Korea Institute of Geoscience and
Mineral Resources, the ­Australia–​­New
Zealand IODP Consortium, and the India
Ministry of Earth Science are associate
members. A nonbinding “memorandum of
understanding” has been signed between
NSF, MEXT, and each contributing and
associate member, setting out the rights
of the members and their financial
contributions to the program.
Commingled funds from the membership fees of the international partners are
provided to the central management office
(­IODP-MI) for integrative activities including scientific planning, drill core curation,
data management, education and outreach, recruitment of new members, publications, and linkages to other programs.
The IODP’s total operational, administrative, and repository budget varies but can
exceed $200 million per year.
All IODP science comes from international, unsolicited proposals that are nurtured and prioritized by IODP’s Science
Advisory Structure (SAS). Membership on
SAS committees and panels is based on
member financial contributions. The number of shipboard berths to which each member is entitled per year on each platform is
also based on financial contributions. The
program has always tried to be flexible,
though, by accommodating requests for
additional berths in regions of special interest to a member country.
International cooperation in IODP has
allowed scientists to explore several important scientific problems. Examples include
drilling near the poles in the Arctic Ocean,
Bering Sea, and off of Antarctica’s Wilkes
Land to look at evidence for past climate
change. The Great Barrier Reef was drilled
to study sea level rise and sea surface temperature warming during the last deglaciation (~20,000–10,000 years ago). And drill
samples have been collected along transects across the equatorial Pacific to obtain
a continuous, ­well-​­preserved sediment section that will make it possible to reconstruct
past climatic and tectonic conditions from
56 million years ago until present. Installation of borehole observatories is also providing the ability to monitor changes in seafloor pressure and temperature to improve
understanding of plate motions in seismically active areas.
The year 2009 was a high point for the
IODP. For the first time, three scientific drilling platforms operated at the same time in
different parts of the ocean. The D/V Chikyu
was drilling the first riser hole off the coast of
Japan to investigate the active seismogenic
region of the Nankai subduction zone. The
D/V JOIDES Resolution was drilling on the
Shatsky Rise in the northwestern Pacific, an
Eos, Vol. 91, No. 43, 26 October 2010
oceanic plateau formed by massive volcanic
eruptions on the seafloor. A mission­specific
platform was drilling sediments on the New
Jersey shelf to estimate the amplitudes,
rates, and mechanisms of sea level change.
All three expeditions were providing new
knowledge on fundamental Earth processes
through drilling.
The Future of Scientific Ocean Drilling
In September 2009, close to 600 scientists
from 21 countries met in Bremen, Germany,
to outline major scientific targets for a new
and ambitious ocean drilling research program [see Ravelo and Bach, 2010]. Since
the Bremen meeting, a new draft science
plan has been written that will lead international scientific ocean drilling into the
future. The research plan is focused around
four themes: (1) Climate and ocean change:
Reading the past, informing the future;
(2) The Biosphere: ­Co-​­evolution of life and
the planet; (3) Deep Earth processes; and
(4) Earth in motion: Geohazards, fluid flow,
and active experimentation (http://​w ww​
.iodp​.org/).
In parallel with the science planning, an
International Working Group Plus (IWG+) has
been formed. IWG+ is composed of current
IODP members and representatives from the
science community, the implementing organizations, and I­ODP-MI. The group is working to define new program principles. Further, IWG+ is using the many lessons learned
on how to manage and operate this longterm international science program to help
ensure the continuation of the successful and
strong international collaborations that support transformative ocean drilling research.
Indeed, the resulting structure of the new program might serve as a model for other ambitious international scientific endeavors.
It is an exciting time in scientific ocean
drilling. Investigations by the worldwide
ocean drilling community continue to
revolutionize researchers’ understanding
of how Earth works and how the planet is
changing on human time scales. A future
ocean drilling program will play a pivotal
role in enhancing this knowledge using
new drilling technologies, installing longterm laboratories deep below the ocean
floor, and conducting active experiments
NEWS
Satellite Monitoring of Pakistan’s
Rockslide-Dammed Lake Gojal
PAGES 394–395
On 4 January 2010, a rockslide 1200
meters long, 350 meters wide, and 125
meters high dammed the Hunza River in
Attabad, northern Pakistan, and formed
Lake Gojal. The initial mass movement of
rock killed 20 people and submerged several
villages and 22 kilometers of the strategic
Karakoram Highway linking Pakistan and
China. Tens of thousands of people were displaced or cut off from overland connection
with the rest of the country.
On 29 May, the lake overflow began to
pour through a spillway excavated by Pakistani authorities. On approximately 20 July,
the lake attained a maximum depth of
119 meters and a torrent at least 9 meters
deep issued over the spillway, according to
Pakistan’s National Disaster Management
Authority (NDMA). To date, the natural dam
is holding and eroding slowly. However,
the threat of a catastrophic outburst flood
remains.
The filling of the lake has been monitored by using Advanced Spaceborne Thermal Emission and Reflection Radiometer
(­A STER) and Advanced Land Imager (ALI)
satellite imagery to map the extent of the
lake and A
­ STER and space shuttle digital terrain data to assess lake volume and
fill history (Figure 1). Field data, adding to
data from orbiting sensors, were obtained
by coauthor Jean Schneider; NDMA; the
Pamir Times, a community news blog; and
Focus Humanitarian Assistance (­FOCUS)–​
­Pakistan. Glaciers, snowmelt, and rainfall
in drill holes. To succeed, however, this
effort will have to continue as a broadly
based international collaboration, bringing
together the best minds and most advanced
capabilities and facilities possible.
References
Ismail-Zadeh, A., and T. Beer (2009), International
cooperation in geophysics to benefit society,
Eos Trans. AGU, 90(51), 493, 501–502,
doi:10.1029/2009EO510001.
Ravelo, C., and W. Bach (2010), Determining
priorities for a new international ocean
drilling program, Eos Trans. AGU, 91(2), 15,
doi:10.1029/2010EO02004.
Author Information
Deborah K. Smith, Department of Geology and
Geophysics, Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution,
Woods Hole, Mass.; also at Division of Ocean
Sciences, NSF, Arlington,Va.; E-mail: dsmith@​whoi​
.edu; Neville Exon, School of Earth Sciences,
Australian National University, Canberra, A. C. T.,
Australia; Fernando J. A. S. Barriga, Faculty of
Sciences, University of Lisbon, Lisbon, Portugal; and
Yoshiyuki Tatsumi, Institute for Research on Earth
Evolution, JAMSTEC,Yokosuka, Japan
runoff are all important in providing water
inflow to the lake at various times throughout the year. Because of the key contribution of melting glaciers during the summer,
­NASA-​­funded Global Land Ice Measurements from Space (GLIMS) data are aiding
with lake monitoring.
At its maximum size, on approximately
20 July, the lake was about 22 kilometers
long and 12 square kilometers, and it contained 585±40 million cubic meters of water
(for comparison, this is about 200 times
the volume of the new stadium for the Dallas Cowboys football team in Texas). Satellite images showed a slight retreat of the
Fig. 1. Lake Gojal. (a) Prelandslide Advanced Spaceborne Thermal Emission and Reflection Radiometer (­ASTER) ­false-​­color image mosaic of the Hunza Valley. Red indicates vegetation (mainly
agricultural fields) and also includes villages. (b) ASTER ­false-​­color image 4 days before the overflow. Note the extensive late spring snowfields and glaciers feeding Lake Gojal. (c) Advanced
Land Imager (ALI) near–true color base image, 7 July 2010, showing the growth of Lake Gojal
based on Satellite Pour l’Observation de la Terre (SPOT), ALI, and ­ASTER imagery.The colors
used to designate the lake mark the growing extent of the lake in the chronological sequence
indicated by the legend.