Hydrographic Survey in the Azores Archipelago - Island of Flores

Since April, the Hydrographic Brigade has been conducting hydrographic surveys throughout the Azores archipelago, already surveying the coastal areas of the islands of S. Miguel, Pico, Faial, São Jorge, Graciosa, and Flores.

Recently, the surveys on the island of Graciosa were completed using a rented vessel, the Scorpion, equipped with a Kongsberg EM 2040C transducer and a Seapath 130, which were installed in a structure manufactured by the military hydrographic brigade to adapt these instruments to a vessel that had never been used for hydrographic purposes before.

There is still a team on the island of Terceira that will use the survey vessel Gaivota to survey the port of Angra do Heroísmo, concluding the planned survey for this island.

These teams have also been conducting topographic surveys of port infrastructure and existing navigational aids on the islands, as a result of reconfiguration works that several ports in the archipelago have undergone.

This work stems from a close cooperation between the Hydrographic Institute and the Directorate General of Maritime Policies of the Regional Government of the Azores, which has been ongoing since 2018. The resulting products will allow these institutions to have high-resolution bathymetric models of the seafloor to support the Marine Spatial Planning process, define policies related to Marine Protected Areas, and update nautical charts of the region, which are essential for any navigator.

As a curiosity, the team that carried out the work on the island of Flores surveyed the westernmost point of Portugal and Europe, circumnavigating the islet of Monchique. Check out the photos for more details.