Research Vessels
Coastwise Engineering completed the concept design of a new research vessel for the Alaska Department of Fish and Game. This vessel is intended to provide fisheries research and test fishing capability to the department throughout the Gulf of Alaska, Aleutian Chain, and the Bering Sea. The vessel will be capable of full operation in winter and reduced operation in light sea ice conditions.
Design Features
The 110-foot-long by 34-foot-wide steel research vessel is designed to be an uninspected research vessel, less than 300 gross tons, but is designed to meet the safety standards of larger research vessels. The vessel is designed to trawl or pot fish to capture its own research specimens. After capture, specimens are sorted and returned to the sea or placed in the wet hold, dry hold, or freezers and analyzed using the vessel’s scientific capabilities in the wet laboratory space.
The vessel’s aft deck can be easily reconfigured to accommodate other Alaskan fisheries and mammal research projects, such as deploying underwater equipment, skiff operations, and remote camp supply operations. Up to 12 scientific personnel can be accommodated in two-person state rooms and researchers will use a dedicated computer laboratory and fully integrated local area networks for data analysis.