Changes in the ocean’s environment, in conjunction with changing weather patterns, have the capacity to adversely impact the stability of maritime cultural heritage (MCH), including underwater, coastal and intertidal archaeological sites.

Although previous research has addressed climate change and archaeological sites, to date there is little understanding of how present changes in the ocean’s chemistry will impact heritage in the future.

Whether through coastal erosion, inundation of coastal areas, sedimentation of sites, alterations to the marine ecosystem, MCH and its associated marine biota are at risk.

The Project:
There is there an unprecedented opportunity to develop a project that measures contemporary ocean acidification and associated environmental changes (including biofauna and at the presence of micro-plastics) at sites in varying environments to create a monitoring framework to measure overtime.

Although originally intended as a workshop, in the current COVID environment a physical meeting is impractical. As such, we would like to invite those interested in participating in a global climate change heritage monitoring project to join us virtually on the 30th of September 2020.

The Forum aims to:
• Identify measurable parameters on maritime cultural heritage sites to monitor the effects of contemporary climate change
• Develop research themes and prioritise these with lead researchers
• Identify and network with potential project partners on agreed research themes

When: 30 September 2020
Where: Zoom
To participate, contact
Deb.Shefi@museum.wa.gov.au

OR see announcement link here.