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Remote vehicle to help Mangrove Cell's Angria Bank Search

The coral reef has the potential to be India's Great Barrier Reef, earlier studies had said

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A diver explores Angria Bank during the first expedition.
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Maharashtra State Mangrove Cell has planned one of its biggest study missions in February to carry out an in-depth research of the Angria Bank -- a submerged plateau with rich coral reef diversity, located around 120 km west of Vijaydurg, Malvan, in the Konkan region. The project is being led by the National Institute of Oceanography (NIO), Goa.

The mission will get a major boost as a remotely operated vehicle (ROV) will be extensively used to study the nooks and corners of the bank. The ROV will be controlled from the mother ship Research Vessel (RV) Sindhu Sadhna, belonging to NIO.

Apart from NIO scientists, underwater photographers as well as marine biologists will be part of the expedition that could last 12-15 days.

The NIO carried out the first expedition, lasting six days, in 2014 and divers found corals in 10 sites, out of the 15 that were reported to be hosting extremely rich and diverse marine fauna and flora. NIO officials even affirmed that Angria Bank not only needs protection but also holds the potential to be an international diving site and could even be India's Great Barrier Reef.

"The second expedition promises to unravel more mysteries of the Angria Bank and information gathered on coral reefs, fishes and the Bank itself will help us plan and propose long-term conservation measures for its protection," said N Vasudevan, Chief Conservator of Forest (CCF) and Head of State Mangrove Cell, who added that the ROV is being procured by NIO from National Institute of Ocean Technology (NIOT).

Vasudevan added that the ROV will be playing an extremely crucial role as there can be regular monitoring and capturing of images underwater. "Humans can dive and stay in water for a particular time period and can capture limited data, but with an ROV, there can be an intense monitoring even at night and even those locations that cannot be accessed by divers can be studied," he said.

The Angria Bank expedition was being carried out under the Government of India-United Nations Development Programme-Global Environment Facility (GoI-UNDP-GEF)Project. NIO is the technical implementation partner.

Dr Subir Ghosh, Project Co-ordinator, said that during the second expedition to Angria Bank they plan to identify areas with a good biodiversity of flora and fauna and then mark them as permanent stations for studying long-term environment impact. According to experts, the threat to the marine life in Angria Bank also needs to be identified and brought to the notice of the government, along with its future tourism potential.

About Angria Bank

A submerged reef with rich coral diversity, it is 39 km in length and 17 km wide. The Angria Bank has good presence of cetacean fauna, represented by whales and dolphins; varieties of fishes including big angel fishes, anemone fishes, groupers, snappers, barracudas, jacks, glass fish, flying fish, pipe fish, leopard eels, parrot fish, goby, scorpion fish, trigger fishes, puffer fish and rays.

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