Mapping cold seeps with high-resolution deep water multibeam echosounders in the Black Sea

Cold seeps are locations at the seafloor where gas and/or fluids are emitting. In contrast to mud volcanoes, which distinctly change the seafloor morphology, cold seeps often lack significant relief. However, in comparison with surrounding sediments seep locations on the sea floor are often characterized by high acoustic backscatter intensity. This was documented during several investigations with deep towed side-scan sonar (SSS) systems in recent years. Authigenic carbonates, free gas and gas hydrates, as evidenced by ground truthing, are responsible for the high backscatter values. Last year's upgrade of the 1°x2° KONGSBERG deep water echosounder EM120 to EM122 on RV Meteor enhanced the system to almost 4 times the previous resolution due to multi-ping and high density signal processing. Based on the physics of sound propagation in the water column, multibeam echosounders (MBES) for deep water use relatively low frequencies of about 12-15 kHz. Apparently highly water-saturated sediments are penetrated by these signals and can cause artificial offsets in bottom detection in comparison to high-frequency echosounders. Nevertheless the effect of the slightly penetrating signal has a useful side effect on the backscatter. Investigations on several seep sites in the Black Sea, carried out with both EM122 and EM710 during Meteror cruise M84-2, resulted in maps of remarkable bathymetric resolution but also showed multibeam backscatter information of a 12 kHz signal to be an excellent tool to map seep-influenced seafloor areas. New seep locations have been mapped in regions of the western Turkish continental margin close to Eregli and of the eastern Turkish margin off Samsun. In both areas high backscatter patches were mapped with nearly comparable resolution as achieved by deep-tow SSS systems. At Eregli the new data is compared with data from a deep-towed EdgeTech SSS system recorded with a frequency of 75 kHz. At Samsun the results are compared with data from a MAK-1M, a deep towed SSS operating at frequencies of 100 kHz; as well as with an OKEAN SSS system, operating at 9.5 kHz. In both areas at 600 - 1200m water depth the backscatter contrast between seep-influenced seafloor areas to the surrounding non-seep sediments is well imaged by the new EM122 system. Sampling of several of the high-backscatter locations revealed the presence of gas hydrates close to the sea floor.