Yesterday was another successful science day with Ginger Elrod and Steve Fitzwater collecting data almost nonstop (except when Francisco Chavez or Bruce Robison's groups are are working). We were able to complete the CTD station and after the ROV went into the water, the bluewater divers went in as well. The wind was pretty high for the scuba dive and we had to kick almost nonstop to keep up with the bluewater trapeze rig. We did collect some interesting animals: radiolarians are very abundant and we also collected a siphonophore as well as a planktonic snail. We completed all of our transects with the ROV as well despite some vehicle problems and caught a glimpse of an interesting squid. This animal was pretty large, we estimate it at about 1 meter long. Today, we are planning on another CTD station around 1300 hours and if the weather is calm, we will also try and complete another bluewater dive.

Chief Mate Darrell Palmer updating our position on the map.

A closeup of a good-sized squid (~1 meter) that the ROV Tiburon videoed around 600 meters deep.

One of the many different forms that radiolarians can take and that we observed and collected during our bluewater dive. This animal is about 1.5 cm across.

I'll send a couple more images of animals from our bluewater dive soon.

Early analysis of the data are very exciting. It is clear that we have done just what we were hoping to do and completed CTD and dive stations both prior to, in, and after the California Current. Here in this figure (salinity) you can see the California Current depicted as a zone of lower salinity (red color). As we passed through the Current (from right to left), we ran CTD stations and dives stations (indicated by the dark vertical lines). There was another ROV dive and CTD station at 126.5 W but that data is not included in this graph yet as the CTD station was only to 200 meters. The water temperature is now up to 18 C and the salinity is up to 34.75 PSU.

Here you can clearly see the California current (region of low salinity - red color) that we passed through. The dark lines indicate stations where Francisco Chavez's group ran CTD stations to gather this data. Salinity units are in Practical Salinity Units (PSU).



      Salinity

29 18.30 N, 140 25.97W

We are steaming at about 9.5 knots with 17 hours to go until our next scheduled dive station. We will be stopping at 1300 hours to do a 1000 meter CTD station but with the winds registering at about 22 knots and a choppy sea, it is unlikely that we'll go bluewater diving today. Happy First Day of Spring everyone! The sun has been out all morning so it feels great. We are an hour behind of you right now and have a scheduled time change again tomorrow so we will be two hours behind of those of you on the West Coast of the U.S. Today we have a planned fire and boat drill at 1600 hours.

Here is our current location about halfway between Moss Landing and Hawaii.

Deckhand/Oiler Andy Stuhan working in the drylab searching the parts database to locate a needed part.

1400 WFT; 1500 PST

29 05.63N, 140 57.15W

We are stopping for a CTD station. The winds and swells are getting larger and we are definitely not going to do a bluewater dive today. Rob Sherlock is helping out in the kitchen this afternoon making up a batch of homemade bread. Second Mate Brian Ackerman is getting prepped for the fire and boat drill at 1600 hours by checking all of the Personal Floatation Devices (PFDs) and the survival suits to make sure that everything is in working order.

Rob Sherlock tossing some bread as he gets ready to bake the bread after a morning of kneading and rising.

George Matsumoto and Steven Haddock helping out in the kitchen after the evening meal.

Second Mate Brian Ackerman amidst a sea of PFDs and survival suits.