The West Australian Mooring Sub-Facility is part of the Australian National Mooring Network.
The Western Australia moorings sub-facility is responsible for a collection of moorings designed to monitor variability in the Leeuwin Current and continental shelf currents both in terms of along-shore and cross-shore variability. Moorings in the region also monitor processes within the Perth Canyon. The time-series monitoring of physical and biological parameters provided by these moorings supplements past and current research activities in the region based at the CSIRO, the Department of Fisheries WA and Western Australian Universities. The sub-facility currently maintains six regional moorings (two recently decommissioned) and two National Reference Stations (one recently retrieved and not redeployed).
The regional moorings are located off Perth, clustered near the Perth Canyon and the Two Rocks Line. The Two Rocks Line contains four moorings which transect the continental shelf north of Perth from the 44m to the 500m isobath (the 50m mooring was decommissioned in May 2013, and the 150m mooring in October 2013). Around the Perth Canyon, there remains one shelf mooring in shallower water at the head of the canyon, formerly two slope moorings were located near the 500m isobath (decommissioned in July 2010 and March 2014), to monitor processes in and around the canyon. Primarily these moorings are thermistor strings allowing the structure of the Leeuwin Current to be determined. Two of the moorings also sample biogeochemical parameters.