NOAA Teacher at Sea
Karolyn Braun
Onboard NOAA Ship Ka’imimoana October 4 – 28, 2006
Mission: TAO Buoy Array Maintenance Geographical Area: Hawaii Date: October 26, 2006
TAS Braun shows off her eggs Benedict
Plan of the Day
Woke up and was in the kitchen at 5:30 a.m. The Breakfast menu: Pancakes Omelets Sausage Bacon Eggs Benedict Breakfast potatoes Fritata Breakfast Sandwiches.
It was the first time I made Eggs Benedict and I tell you the sauce is a killer. You have to continually whisk the melted butter while adding the egg yolks. If you don’t, the mixture separates and you lose your sauce. I thought all was lost, but I was able to bring it back and ended up making one mean Eggs Benedict! Everyone seemed happy with his or her breakfast to order. As soon as breakfast was over we cleaned up and started preparing for lunch. I thought working with the deck crew was hot and sweaty work but the kitchen blew that out of the water.
Mexican Fiesta Lunch menu: Pork Green Chili Veggie Fajita Refried beans Super Nachos Beef Fajitas And all the fixings Lunch went well and things slowed up after everyone left. We cleaned the kitchen and started preparing for dinner but it was at a more leisurely pace. For dinner I made garlic chicken with spinach noodles, Steak with Spanish rice and some leftovers from lunch. I finished my day around 5:30 when I took a much-needed shower and a 20-minute power nap. Woke up to watch them drop the anchor to the TAO buoy at 8N.170W. Is it bedtime yet?
I have to give the stewards of all the NOAA ships lots of credit. They work long hard days, and from my experience, always with a smile.
Some crewmembers of the KA’IMIMOANA enjoy some of TAS Braun’s cooking.
NOAA Teacher at Sea
Karolyn Braun
Onboard NOAA Ship Ka’imimoana October 4 – 28, 2006
Mission: TAO Buoy Array Maintenance Geographical Area: Hawaii Date: October 25, 2006
TAS Braun enjoys her birthday dinner with the crew.
Plan of the Day
This morning started off with lots of Happy Birthdays! Yes today I am turning another year older….wow. Can’t believe I am leaving my 20’s behind and welcoming the 30’s! Well today was pretty relaxing. At breakfast the crew gave me the Birthday hat to wear.
I had to wear it all day, so I did. I spooled a few lines when we started the recovery of the 4N TAO buoy then talked to my parents on the phone….Hi mom and dad! I spent a half hour in the pool. Very nice afternoon for a swim. After my swim, I got ready for dinner. The Stewards made my favorite dinner: Pork chops and mashed potatoes with applesauce. YUMMY! They also sang and made a birthday cake for me. It was a very nice birthday here on the KAIMIMOANA.
NOAA Teacher at Sea
Brett Hoyt
Onboard NOAA Ship Ronald H. Brown October 8 – 28, 2006
Mission: Recovery and maintenance of buoy moorings Geographical Area: Southeast Pacific, off the coast of Chile Date: October 25, 2006
Weather Data from Bridge
Visibility: 12nm (nautical miles)
Wind direction: 150º
Wind speed: 5 knots
Sea wave height: 1-2ft
Swell wave height: 4-6 ft
Sea level pressure: 1017.1 millibars
Sea temperature: 16.7ºC or ºF
Air temperature: 17.9ºC or ºF
Cloud type: Stratus
Reggie Glover – Engine Utility Man (“Oilier”) helping keep the ship running smooth. Thanks Reggie!
The Crew
For the past 3 weeks we have been highlighting the scientists and their work. The other unsung heroes of this cruise are the ship’s crew. These tireless workers work 7 days a week and are on call 24 hours a day. They are up before dawn and go to bed well after sunset. They feed us three square meals a day (they are excellent chefs) and provide us even with the water we drink and bath with. Without our crew the research does not happen. For this we thank you.
Being a crewmember on a research vessel such as the RONALD BROWN has many hardships. You can’t go to the movies (they show two every night—not always your choice but you can request a movie to be played) or head to the mall (they do have a ship’s store—by the way I’ve seen bigger closets), but it’s our mall, and for this Dave, we thank you for running it. You can’t go for a walk in the park or even stroll down a neighborhood street. Your work place is also your home and you can’t leave either. But ………………for all these sacrifices how many of you can say you have really seen the world? For most of us, our “world” may only be the country we live in or perhaps the neighborhood we played in as a child. To you I ask, have you ever seen the sunset in Fiji or the glaciers in the Straits of Magellan? Have you ever visited a land that has not seen any rainfall in over 150 years? Have you ever gazed upon the heads of Easter Island or experienced 45ft waves in the Bearing Sea? If not, then you have not seen the world. It is because of this unique attraction for the world and all that is in it, that many people choose the life of a sailor.
Any one like big diesel engines? Jim Reed inspects the heart of the ship, which has six of these huge diesel engines connected to very large electric generators that feed enough electricity to power the two engines that turn the propellers.
Today we will visit with Reggie Glover on board the RONALD H. BROWN. Reggie is a friendly, always there with a smile, genuinely kind man of 34 years of age. He has been a seaman for the past 3 years and has served on numerous ships. He got his start washing dishes for the Military Sealift Command. He was a civilian who worked on ships that supplied U.S. Naval ships. In only 2 and a half years he has worked his way up to “wiper.” Upon leaving the Sealift Command and joining NOAA, he changed jobs to become an “Engine Utility Man.” His past jobs have included truck driver, hotel employee, and fast food worker. When I asked Reggie why he decided to go to sea he replied, “College isn’t for everyone” and his career at sea provided an excellent opportunity to achieve financial freedom. “Money is good, there is tons of overtime, you don’t have to pay rent, and meals are provided. Your paycheck is all yours to save or to spend.”
Reggie has not always had it “easy.” Just before going to sea he was temporarily homeless. The sea provided a new career and a fresh start. When I asked Reggie what message he wanted to tell students he replied, “Come out to sea with a goal in mind, stick with it, and enjoy the feeling of accomplishment. If your life isn’t going the way you want, perhaps a job at sea would be an alternative to jail, homelessness, or even college.” Reggie goes on to say that joining NOAA’s workforce provides many opportunities to advance your skills and education. NOAA has sent Reggie to Engine Utility School and Refrigeration School and he is planning on taking welding school this fall. He is currently working towards his 3AE (third assistant engineer).
One of the benefits he has enjoyed the most has been the free travel in seeing the world and meeting different people in it. After visiting with Reggie I can sense he has his goals and will achieve them through his persistence and dedication to a job well done.
Please contact the Marine Operations Center – Atlantic at (757) 441-6206, or Marine Operations Center – Pacific at (206) 553-4548, if you have any questions.
The Teacher
This is my final log and I would like to thank all those folks at NOAA who saw fit to send me half way around the world for the journey of a lifetime and a chance to participate in one of the most worthwhile projects any teacher could hope to imagine. I would also like to thank Dr. Bob Weller and all the crew from Woods Hole who took time to answer my questions and make me feel like one of the team. (Love to scrape those barnacles!) I would like to thank the captain and his crew for keeping us safe and making me feel very much at home 5,000miles from home. And, I would like to personally thank Lt. (JG) Jackie Almeida for her input and edits on my Teacher at Sea logs and for her help in making my job easier. If you are a teacher and would like the experience of a lifetime, go to the Teacher at Sea website and apply today.
NOAA Teacher at Sea
Karolyn Braun
Onboard NOAA Ship Ka’imimoana October 4 – 28, 2006
Mission: TAO Buoy Array Maintenance Geographical Area: Hawaii Date: October 24, 2006
A pilot whale breaches the surface of the water.
Plan of the Day
Well it was a long early morning. I was awoken at 2 a.m. to prepare for the 300 CTD profile. By the time I was finished and all was said and done, it was time for the next one. We sailed by the TAO buoy and all looked well so we went ahead and conducted the CTD and deployed the AOML. My last CTD for the day was the 1230 profile at 2.5N/170W. Eric from MBARI will be doing the evening one. I walked on the treadmill for an hour then made a nice salad for lunch. I honestly don’t eat this much on my own. It’s easy to eat when every meal is made for you. One can easily gain weight out here. I did some knot tying and rested a bit but did not want to nap, as I would not sleep tonight. We saw another pod of Pilot whales off the port bow playing in the water. Snapped a few good photos.
Lets talk about whales shall we? Whales are mammals, and there are five distinct groups of marine mammals: Pinnepeds, which include seals, sea lions, fur seals and walruses; Sea Otters; Cetaceans containing whales, dolphins and porpoises; Sirenians which consist of dugongs and manatees; and Polar Bears. So what does it mean to be a marine mammal? Well like all mammals, they are warm-blooded, they have at least a few hairs on their bodies, and they nourish their young with milk. These mammals are protected under the Marine Mammal Protection Act that was enacted in 1979, which made it illegal to “take” any marine mammal. The term “take” includes harass, hunt, capture, collect, or kill, or attempt to do the same. “Harass” denotes the act of pursuit, torment, or annoyance that has potential to disturb marine mammals. In1994 it was amended to strengthen the definition of harass and included feeding.
Pilot whales have been hunted for many centuries, particularly by Japanese whalers. In the mid-1980s the annual Japanese kill was about 2,300 animals. This had decreased to about 400 per year by the 1990s. Killing by harpoon is still relatively common in the Lesser Antilles, Indonesia and Sri Lanka. Hundreds or perhaps thousands are killed each year in longline and gillnets. However, due to poor record-keeping it is not known how many kills are made each year, and what the effect this has on the local population. Female pilot whales mature at 6 years of age and a length of about 3.5 m. Males mature much later when 12 years old and 5 m in length. Mature adult males, which are generally larger than females, can weigh as much as 3 tons. At birth, calves weigh slightly over 200 lbs. They are born after a pregnancy of 16 months, and are weaned at around 20 months of age.
Pilot whales have strong social cohesiveness; it is rare to see a single individual. Even when being driven ashore by whalers, they would stay together as a group. Groups typically contain animals of both sexes and many different ages. The males may compete for breeding privileges, forming a hierarchy that excludes smaller males. Large assemblages may also be composed of smaller, close-knit groups, which are stable over time. Pilot whales are some of the noisiest whales in the ocean. Their group structure requires social communication, and they orient to prey objects by echolocation. Vocalizations include a wide variety of whistles and clicks.
NOAA Teacher at Sea
Brett Hoyt
Onboard NOAA Ship Ronald H. Brown October 8 – 28, 2006
Mission: Recovery and maintenance of buoy moorings Geographical Area: Southeast Pacific, off the coast of Chile Date: October 24, 2006
Data from Bridge
Visibility: 12nm (nautical miles)
Wind direction: 140º
Wind speed: 4 knots
Sea wave height: 0-1ft
Swell wave height: 6-8 ft
Sea level pressure: 1018.5 millibars
Sea temperature: 18.1ºC or 64 ºF
Air temperature: 18.7ºC or 65 ºF
Cloud type: stratus
Deployment of the new tsunami buoy began at 6am on October 23. The scientists deployed the buoy first and then plan to deploy the Bottom Pressure Recorder (BPR). The reason for this is that the BPR must be located close enough to the buoy for the acoustic communication from the BPR to reach the surface buoy. As there are only a few instruments from the Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution on the buoy, this deployment process only took a few hours instead of most of the day. They plan on letting the buoy settle for many hours before they deploy the BPR. One of the challenges for the tsunami buoy is that unlike the Stratus 7 buoy which had a “watch circle” (the distance the buoy could wander) of over 3 miles, the tsunami buoy has a watch circle of no more than 1,500 meters. This difference is that you don’t want the buoy wandering out of range of the Bottom Pressure Recorder transmitter. To achieve this, the scientists must make the mooring line exactly the right length. The day before they deployed the buoy the scientists measured the contours of the ocean floor and knew precisely how deep the water was. At the last minute, the scientists from the Chilean Navy cut and spliced a piece of mooring line to exactly the right length. (See photo)
The Scientists
Here a scientist from the Chilean Navy is seen splicing in an eye into the line after it was cut to length. This process ensures that the buoy stays in the right location and does not wander too far.
The Machine
The Chilean Government’s tsunami buoy in the South Pacific. This is only half of the warning equation.The Bottom Pressure Recorder (BPR) with its anchor attached.
The Experiment
There was no experiment.
Classroom Activities
There is no classroom activity, as creating your own tsunami in the classroom would be way too messy.
