Quake researchers at fault for empty catch

Scientists monitoring New Zealand’s largest fault line have fished up monitoring instruments with no data on them because of programming errors.

As part of ongoing research into the Hikurangi subduction zone off the North Island’s east coast, seismic monitoring instruments are being placed on and removed from the ocean floor.

Dr Samer Naif, assistant research professor at the Lamont-Doherty Earth Observatory at Columbia University, who is leading the current voyage, said three instruments recently fished up by scientists had no data on them.

‘‘Three of the 170 ocean-bottom electromagnetic (OBEM) receivers . . . were set to the wrong date.’’

The instruments record electric and magnetic data. The data collected on the current voyage would be used to construct an image ‘‘like a medical MRI’’ of fluid conditions below the sea floor. Fluid conditions affect the likelihood and type of earthquakes that occur at faults.

The team lost about 2 per cent of the overall data.

One person was tasked with setting the recording date, and a second person checked the settings to confirm correctness.

‘‘This was a case of user error, where the date was accidentally programmed with the wrong year. It happened at a time when we were trying to work really quickly to avoid a weather front with rough seas and galeforce winds forecast to arrive later that day,’’ Naif said. ‘‘We now have a third person checking the time and date prior to the release of the instrument.’’

The voyage, on board the research vessel the Rodger Revelle, was being led by the Lamont-Doherty Earth Observatory, and was funded by the US National Science Foundation.