Bhubaneswar, Aug. 5: A coastal monitoring vessel of the Odisha State Pollution Control Board, under the Integrated Coastal Zone Management Project, was dedicated to the state today from Paradip port.

The vessel, Sagar Utkal, is expected to boost to oceanographic studies along the coast. The vessel was inducted for in-situ and on-board scientific analysis of oceanographic environment parameters.

Oceanographic study would play an important role in establishing the baseline data of the coastal stretch, which, in the long run, would give a realistic assessment of health of the seacoast.

The vessel would help in scientific assessment of the 80km coastal stretch from Dhamra to Paradip in the Bay of Bengal. Besides, microscopic observation of biological oceanography activities can now be meticulously performed with the on-board laboratory facility put in place at the vessel, said Anupam Behera, nodal officer of the Integrated Coastal Zone Management Project.

Sagar Utkal is a double-hulled 18.5m-long catamaran with seven-metre width. It is a typical research vessel that sails at a slow pace of eight nautical miles per hour with a laboratory facilities for on-board scientific analysis.