Alkor (ship, 1990)
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The Alkor is a German research ship . The owner is the state of Schleswig-Holstein . The ship is operated by the Helmholtz Center for Ocean Research Kiel (GEOMAR) and the ship is managed by Briese Schiffahrt in Leer . The operational planning is the responsibility of the “Medium-sized Research Vessels” steering group at the Institute for Oceanography at the University of Hamburg .
history
The ship was built in 1989/90 under the construction number 0181 at the Cassens shipyard in Emden . The keel was laid on September 9, 1989, the launch took place on September 11, 1989. The ship, which was completed in April 1990, was put into service on May 2, 1990 and replaced the research cutter of the same name built in 1965. The ship was financed as a special project by the Federal Ministry for Research and Technology. The construction costs amounted to around 33 million DM; the state of Schleswig-Holstein assumed ten percent of the costs.
The Alkor is a sister ship of the research ship Heincke of the Biological Institute Helgoland of the Alfred Wegener Institute for Polar and Marine Research . It is named after the companion star Alkor of the star Mizar in the Great Bear , also known as the “little rider” .
In addition to the research vessel Alkor , GEOMAR also operates the research cutter Littorina and the research boat Arctic Fox .
description
The ship is powered by diesel-electric technology . An electric motor from Lloyd Dynamowerke (type: GC 395/103/6) with an output of 1,100 kW is available as the drive motor . The electric motor acts on a fixed propeller and gives the ship a top speed of 12 knots . Three diesel generators, each with 800 kVA, as well as an auxiliary diesel (195 kVA) and an emergency generator (35 kVA) are available for power generation.
The ship has an operational radius of around 7,500 nautical miles and can stay at sea for up to 30 days. It has four laboratories (wet, dry, thermal and multi-purpose laboratory ) as well as winches , various lifting tools such as cranes and a swiveling rear boom and echo sounder systems for research purposes.
The Alcor has a Permit to Small ride and is predominantly in the Baltic Sea , the Skagerrak and Kattegat and the North Sea used. Their longest voyage was in the coastal waters off Portugal . By 2012 she had carried out around 400 longer research trips, covering over 520,000 nautical miles.
predecessor
The predecessor ship of the same name , a 30.8 meter long research cutter measured at 236 GRT, was commissioned in 1966. He worked for the Institute for Oceanography in Kiel for 24 years until 1990 and covered 326,000 nautical miles during this time. The cutter is sailing today as an alk under the flag of the Netherlands.
Web links
- Research ship Alkor , GEOMAR Helmholtz Center for Ocean Research Kiel
- Cruise planning of German research vessels - research vessel Alkor , Federal Maritime and Hydrographic Agency
- List of all trips made so far with links to the scientific trip reports