NOAA Teacher at Sea
Robert Oddo
Onboard NOAA Ship Ronald H. Brown July 11 – August 10, 2009
Mission: PIRATA (Prediction and Research Moored Array in the Atlantic) Geographical area of cruise: Tropical Atlantic Date: July 30, 2009
Deploying a buoy
Weather Data from the Bridge
Outside Temperature 25.50oC
Relative Humidity 87%
Sea Surface Temperature 25.75oC
Barometric Pressure 1017.3 inches
Latitude 20 09.721 N Longitude 33 34.806 W
Science and Technology Log
On the 28th of July we did our 34th CTD and changed out our third buoy and started to steam west back towards the states. We have a break now from our 12-hour shifts and only have one more buoy to change out and only one more CTD to deploy. I wanted to write about a couple of things that I have noticed over the last couple weeks when sampling that I thought were noteworthy. The seawater we collect from 1500 feet down in the ocean, even though we are in the tropics, is still very cold. It is about 4 degrees C or 39 degrees F while the sea surface temperature is around 26 degrees C or 79 degrees F.
Nightly Science Seminar
Another thing that is really cool is that when we are doing CTDs at night the lights from the ship attract squid and you can watch the squid chasing flying fish at the surface. The last thing that is strange, is that every once in a while even though we are hundreds of miles away from land, a butterfly or dragonfly darts around the ship. You just wonder where they have come from.Every night around 8 pm, there is meeting of all the scientists onboard. We usually get a weather briefing and then someone will give a seminar on the work they are doing. There are many links between the work that each scientist is doing on this ship and this is an important way to share ideas, get feedback and create new questions.
Personal Log
There is down time on the ship and I wrote about the movies earlier. We have a ping-pong table set up in the main lab where we play in our spare time. Since we are so far from any land, safety is very important on the ship. We have fire drills and abandon ship drills weekly. After the drill there is a briefing and the safety officer discusses some of the safety equipment the ship has and its use. Today we went out to the fantail and the officers demonstrated how to use flares and smoke signals.
A little ping pong in the main lab (left) and flare demonstration (right)Research cruise plan
NOAA Teacher at Sea
Tiffany Risch
Onboard NOAA Ship Delaware II July 28 – August 8, 2008
Mission: Clam and Quahog Survey Geographical Area: South of Long Island, NY Date: August 2, 2008
Weather Data from the Bridge
Mostly cloudy with isolated showers
Surface winds: 5 to 10 knots
Waves: Swells 2-4 feet
Water temperature: 23o Celsius
Visibility: 7 nautical miles
The dredge being brought back up onto the ship after being deployed
Science and Technology Log
As I began my shift, I noticed on the map hanging in the dry lab that we are working our way towards an area southeast of Nantucket called Georges Bank. Georges Bank is a shallow rise underwater where a variety of sea life can be found. Before long, we were called to the deck for our first station of the morning. We set the dredge, hauled it back, sorted the catch, measured and recorded data, and moved on to the next station. Recording data and sorting are two of my favorite things to do, especially when it involves shucking the clams for the meat to be measured! My watch seemed to be on a record pace, as we managed to complete seven hauls all before breakfast at 5:00am. This process happens around the clock on the DELAWARE II, maximizing the amount of data we collect while at sea for two weeks.
Later in the day, the winch that is used to haul the dredge back from the water suffered a power problem. I and the person controlling the dredge noticed this right away, as one of my jobs is to switch the power on to the pump that the dredge uses. I alerted my watch chief, and also the chief scientist for this cruise who quickly began to assess the situation. Over the next hour or so, things became very busy on the back deck as the captain, engineers, and scientists tried to solve the problem. They did manage to get the power back to the winch again, which enabled the dredge to be brought back onboard the ship. The amount of talent exhibited by so many people on this ship continues to amaze me. They always have answers for everything, and Plan B for any situation is always on their minds!
Collecting and sorting the variety of marine life that we find. Here, TAS Risch holds up some sea stars.
Personal Log
Today was a really exciting day of sorting, as my watch found a variety of different organisms. I actually saw a live scallop clapping in the bucket after it was hauled up! Other interesting creatures included a Little Skate (Raja erinacea), which is a fish made of cartilage and is closely related to rays and sharks, a sea robin, sea squirts, hermit crabs, some sea stars, and even a few flounders. One of the more unusual characters that we encountered onboard was called a Yellow boring sponge, otherwise known as a Sulfur sponge or “Monkey Dung”. We take measurements of all of these things and quickly return them to their home in the ocean. Very early this morning, around 1:00am I visited the bridge, or the area where the captain controls and steers the ship from, to see what everything looks like at night. Crew member Claire Surrey was on the bridge tonight, making sure the ship stayed on its course. The area was very quiet and dimly lit by the various monitors that broadcast
information back to the officer in charge. The ocean was pitch black, and I could only see faint lights of a few other ships bobbing up and down in the waves very far away. What a cool experience to see the ocean at night, with a starry sky, and know that all types of instruments are guiding my voyage through the sea!
New Words/Terms Learned
Min-logs: sense temperature, depth, and pressure underwater on the dredge, and are brought back to the surface and recorded via computer.
NOAA Teacher at Sea
Mark Friedman
Onboard NOAA Ship Rainier June 8-20, 2008
Mission: Hydrographic Survey and ocean seafloor mapping Geographical Area: Southeast Alaska Date: June 8-9, 2008
NOAA Teacher at Sea, Mark Friedman, helps deploy the CTD prior to surveys in SE Alaskan environs.
Science and Technology Log
This is a NOAA (National Oceanographic and Atmospheric Administration) ship based out of the U.S. Northwest. This ship is primarily dedicated to the construction and updating of marine navigational charts that are of importance to marine commerce, navigation and general recreation. To do this they use SONAR waves emitted from the bottom of the launch boats. (Underwater sound waves travel at 1500 meters per second, four times as fast as sound in air.) Data obtained by the ships surveyors are sent to marine map makers (cartographers) in Seattle and also NOAA’S base in Silver Spring, Maryland where they are processed and constructed and made available to the public in paper or digital format.
June 8
Arrived Juneau Alaska. Greeted at the airport by the ship’s XO (Executive Officer). Onboard I was issued a bunk (or a rack as mariners call it) and given a ship tour. Once settled I visited the town, including a significant museum of history, artifacts and anthropology of the indigenous peoples and early European settlers. Juneau is a stopping off point for many of the Northwest cruise ships cruising the inside passage.
June 9
Snowcapped mountains surround the inside passage south of Juneau, AK
Safety instructions: multiple videos on asbestos, personal safety, fire emergencies. Drill practice: Abandon ship, Man overboard. Survival suit issued along with multiple style life vests, hardhat. Underway from Juneau 1600 for destinations near Sitka to begin depth soundings for marine navigational chart additions and corrections. All is well. Bright outside and it’s nearly 9pm Wednesday night. Sunset is at 10pm and sunrise at 3:15am. It is a long day by our usual Los Angeles standards. The water is 41 degrees (so you don’t want to fall in or risk hypothermia (rapid loss of base body temperature (Who can guess the temperature of hypothermia?) which rapidly sets in) and the air a cool and misty 51 degrees.
Green conifers line the banks and small islands proliferate in the inner passage here just south of Sitka. The inside passage was made by a combination of glaciers, volcanic and plate tectonic action (subduction of North American and Pacific plates). The tide differential from high to low can be extreme…nearing 30 feet in the Juneau harbor! Spruce and pine trees abound, and snow-capped mountains on either side of us rise up majestically as we move along at about 12 knots (nautical speed terminology, or about 15 mph). The spruce are afflicted by the same type of exponential pine beetle growth that is devastating California and Southwest evergreens. No drought up here so scientists have no hypothesis yet as to the cause.
I had to get up at 4am yesterday (even earlier than my usual 5am school day rise) for a wild ride thru close straits (aptly named Peril) (must get there at high tide so there is enough clearance beneath and currents are not as dangerous with increased volume of water) entering Sitka for our first series of data collection, cartography of inside passage.
The bridge of NOAA Ship RAINIER
RAINIER to the Rescue
There is an important heavy emphasis on safety and special cold water survival suits and vests, have been issued to all crew members, followed by instruction donning them and knowing out stations to report to for such rises as “fire onboard” and “man overboard.” We have already had an abandon ship drill. Yesterday after I joined three boats of marine surveyors which go out to surrounding areas in 29 foot launches to begin data collection thru the use of sonar, the RAINIER saved two fisherpeople whose boat had taken on water and was rapidly sinking. RAINIER heard their MAYDAY and was within 2 miles so they sent a rapid launch to the scene and got there even before the Coast Guard. Fortunately the fisherpeople had on their survival suits so they were not in too much shock when they were rescued. It brought home to me the importance of these survival suits that are like insulated neoprene wetsuits that are watertight. I’m always wearing some type of floatation vest while on deck or in the launch, colored bright orange for easy sighting when bobbing up and down in choppy seas.
Personal Log
I saw some favorites yesterday too…but not too close. Sea otters and whales but too far away to identify. The most common up here now are the humpbacks. The gray whales that have migrated up from Baja California, the ones that can bee seen off the California coast are already further north feasting on that yummy krill, a marine crustacean key to the food web). And the ship’s cuisine—fine and more than plentiful prepared by multiple professional chefs…lots of healthy food and Tapatio, my newfound hot sauce delight thanks to my Mexicano and Latino students.
Fortunately there is a gym so I hopefully won’t come back TOO much heavier. Crew and staff of about 50…mostly young, lots of women for a big change from my last extended marine experience six years ago on the R/V New Horizon out of Scripps Institute of Oceanography in San Diego.
Vocabulary and Marine Terminology Hydrography- the science of measuring, describing and mapping the sea bottom, mudflats and the positions of stationary objects (seamounts, shipwrecks, etc.) Cartographer-makes nautical charts for the aid of moving ships on the ocean Echosounder-high resolution instrument to record depths of ocean bottom using SONAR (SOund Navigation And Ranging – similar to some marine mammals use of echolocation). Also a side-scan sonar can be used and is on the RAINIER. CTD-Instrument to collect and register conductivity (flow of electrical current), temperature and depth. Deployed by ship launches in each surveyed area to obtain data and make calculations on sound speeds of sonar under various conditions (deeper, warmer and saltier water increases the speed of sound waves due to density) Sound speed- Sound travels at a speed of 1500 meters/second faster than thru air that is 380 meters per second. (This enables whales to communicate over hundreds of m8iles of water)
Get Your Hands Wet
To learn HOW TO MAKE YOUR OWN HYDROGRAPHIC PROJECT, go to this NOAA website.
Question of the Day: Predict the mass and size of each scallop pictured above. Match them with the masses and lengths shown below.
Yesterday’s Answer: Answers may be different.
flat body allows it to lay camouflaged on the bottom
tail fin allows it to move through the water
spiny back and tail protect it from predators
long, slender body allows it to move faster through the water
strong muscle allows it to close the shell to keep out predators
strong arms allow it to pry open shells for food
Science and Technology Log
“Scallops are a family of bivalve mollusks; there are several hundred species of scallops, found in marine environments all over the world. Like most other bivalves, they consume phytoplankton and other small particles by filter-feeding. Unlike many bivalves (e.g., clams, which bury in the sediments), they live on the bottom surface, and can move by swimming. Atlantic sea scallops (Placopecten magellanicus, also known giant scallops or deep sea scallops) live only in the northwest Atlantic from Cape Hatteras to Newfoundland and the Gulf of St. Lawrence. Sea scallops usually spawn in late summer or early fall, though spring spawning may also occur. After hatching, larvae stay in the water column for 4-6 weeks. At settlement, they attach to a hard object by means of byssal threads produced by a gland at the end of their foot.”
*Thanks to Dvora Hart, Northeast Fisheries Science Center, for supplying the scallop information.
On Sunday, I was able to operate the Conductivity, Temperature, and Depth instrument by myself. This instrument is lowered into the water at every third designated stations. Data is collected as the instrument descends to the bottom. This data includes salinity (saltiness), temperature, and depth of the water. This is important since various marine animals require ideal temperatures to survive. Today’s CTD went down to 80 meters (think 80 meter sticks deep) and recorded a temperature of about 5 °C. That ‘s cold!
Personal Log
Scallop Catch
The heavy dredge is ready for another timely tow,
Expect to catch the scallops, to the surface they will go.
Dropping to the bottom where its 80 meters deep,
Spending fifteen minutes dragging and bringing in the keep.
Then they’re sorted on the surface while hiding in their shell,
The aging/growth ridges on their outside’s what they tell.
