Standing Watch – On the Dark Side

On most ships, the captain and crew use a watch system to make sure there are always people awake to safely operate the vessel and maintain productivity.   Scientific crew typically does the same thing.  Because this cruise is more exploratory with a wide variety of research operations, our watches are a little more free form than usual.  Nevertheless, we need to keep the science going 24-7, and to make this happen we have essentially split our operations into two periods and activities. The day shift, led by Reide, is focusing on water-column and seabed sampling.   At night we have a skeleton group for seafloor mapping and sub-bottom and current profiling.

The ship at night is quiet.  It’s peaceful, but it also can be downright painful.  After 8 hours, watching a computer screen at 5 AM can be grueling… and this will drive those on watch a little batty.  In an effort to keep alert we’ll analyze data, talk, eat, play music, write computer code, make jokes and, of course, drink coffee.  While oceanographic research is often very interesting, the ocean is big, and gathering data can be mind-numbing.  It’s helpful to have creative and fun folks around to make the long hours a little more entertaining.  

4:19 AM:  Trip takes a break from writing Matlab code to proces ADCP data.

4:22 AM: Keith keeps "cleaning" multibeam data.

4:21 AM: J.P. pretends to type on computer while watching multibeam data.

6:28 AM: The sun starts to rise.  Another ship is on the horizon.

6:42 AM: Day is breaking. Dinner (breakfast) is almost ready!

Goodbye to the Knorr

The science party was treated to a special moment yesterday.  As we steamed north towards Cape Hatteras, we rendez-voused with our ship's predecessor on its journey south to its new home. The R/V Knorr was the research vessel that found the Titantic, and it had a long and accomplished research career.  This was a sentimental moment for the crew as many had spent years working aboard her.  

The vessel was retired from the U.S. ocean research fleet in 2014 and was purchased by Mexico.  An article in Oceanus discusses the Knorr’s distinguished history, “Over the past 44 years, Knorr has conducted research from the Arctic Circle to the Southern Ocean and many places in between. Knorr has also taken part in some of the 20th century’s greatest ocean discoveries, from locating the wreck of R.M.S. Titanic to finding completely unknown and unexpected life forms on the seafloor…  When Knorr retires at the end of 2014, it will have traveled more than 1.35 million miles—a distance equivalent to more than two round trips to the moon.”

It was fitting that the Knorr steamed south under a picturesque sunset...

Science Ops off the R/V Neil Armstrong

To all you SSTORM-troopers...thanks for checking out our research. We left Charleston, SC on Wednesday morning and have been working around the clock. We are currently about 20 miles offshore of Cape Hatteras. We have been surveying the seafloor off the coast evaluating geomorphic variations. As this data is collected, we select interesting sites to collect sediment samples using a multi-core device (see photos). The samples will provide insights into the type of sediment depositing and the nature of transport and accumulation. We put together a multi-disciplinary team of scientist for the cruise...the characters (beyond Walsh and I) are:

Erin Field - a microbiologist and will be studying microbes in the water column and surface sediments
Sid Mitra - an organic geochemist evaluating the sources and fate of black carbon on the margin
Mike Muglia - a scientist and PhD student focused on Gulf Stream dynamics
Dave Sybert - focuses on outreach at the UNC CSI

There are also several graduate students (Ryan Gibbons, Ian Conery, Beau Benfield, Caroline Webb) and technicians (Keith Garmire, Trip Taylor) onboard helping get the research done. It is nice getting back out on the "big blue", especially on this brand new global-class research vessel. This cruise is part of a Science Verification process of the new ship. Our objective is to collect data to meet as many of our scientific objective as possible AND to help evaluate processes that are working well on the ship and those that may need some improvement. Although it is a very experienced captain and crew, it is a brand new ship, so just about everything is a "first" for this ship. We are trying to help work out the kinks as we collect our own data. Pretty exciting!

Steaming Out to Sea

This March 16-27, we have a research cruise to study the continental margin off SC and NC in collaboration with scientists from Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution and the USGS.  After loading vehicles at UNC CSI and then ECU, we caravaned to Charleston, SC to meet the R/V Neil Armstrong.  Mobilization onto the ship took a day, and we headed out to sea on March 16th.  The weather has been fair and seas have been calm to start our expedition.

Single Beam Survey off Rodanthe

Keith Garmire (a research technician in the Coastal Processes Program) and I are "mowing the lawn" behind Rodanthe, a small village on the Outer Banks. Mowing the lawn on the water...no I haven't lost my mind. We are measuring the bathymetry (changes in depth) in our study area around the DoT emergency ferry channel. This is done in a grid pattern to get the best data coverage, similar to a pattern you would use when mowing the lawn. This very accurate bathymetric map will be used to help us understand sediment disturbance and transport in this area of Hatteras Flats. That information is critical when evaluating how and where to deposit material removed from the channel in future dredging projects.

This is all part of an interdisciplinary project funded by NCDoT to provide the science necessary to better manage the future of this important waterway.