NOAA Teacher at Sea
Marilyn Frydrych
Onboard NOAA Ship Delaware II September 15-25, 2008
Mission: Atlantic Herring Hydroacoustic Survey Geographical area of cruise: New England Coastal Waters Date: September 25, 2008
Weather Data from the Bridge
41.27 degrees N, 70.19 degrees W
Partly Cloudy with wind out of the W at 19 knots
Dry Bulb Temperature: 26.0 degrees Celsius
Wet Bulb Temperature: 20.9 degrees Celsius
Waves: 2 feet Visibility: 10 miles
Sea Surface Temperature: 21.6 degrees Celsius
Science and Technology Log
We received a call from the Coast Guard yesterday telling us to seek shelter because of the impending interaction of Hurricane Kyle with a strong cold front approaching us. We cut our cruise a day short and headed for Woods Hole. As we headed back in I had time to reflect on my experiences over the last couple weeks. I particularly appreciated all the positive energy of the scientific crew. They were always very helpful and thoughtful as well as efficient. I learned a lot from them. Each morning I found myself looking forward to what might unfold as we worked together. I totally enjoyed my four or five hours of free time each day. Often I would spend this time on the bow or the fantail taking in the rhythm of the sea. It was a very soothing experience much like watching a camp fire. The sunsets, too, brought a sense of awe and peace.
Each of the crew was a master of multiple tasks. Jon Rockwell was not only an expert cook, but a medic as were three others aboard. As part of their initial training with the NOAA Corps the four officers had entered a room fully in flames and totally filled with smoke. If they had to, they could navigate by the stars. Two of the officers were NOAA trained SCUBA divers. The engineers could fix anything whether it had to do with distilling water, leaking hydraulic pipes, stuck drawers, broken toilets, cracked welds, or the various diesel engines. They were experts in the “green” rules governing disposal of waste. The ET specialist could fix both hardware and software. The scientists knew their software programs backwards and forwards. All very impressive.
NOAA Teacher at Sea
Marilyn Frydrych
Onboard NOAA Ship Delaware II September 15-25, 2008
Mission: Atlantic Herring Hydroacoustic Survey Geographical area of cruise: New England Coastal Waters Date: September 24, 2008
Weather Data from the Bridge
41.27 degrees N, 70.19 degrees W
Partly Cloudy with winds out of the W at 19 knots
Dry Bulb Temperature: 26.0 degrees Celsius
Wet Bulb Temperature: 20.9 degrees Celsius
Waves: 2 feet
Visibility: 10 miles
Sea Surface Temperature: 21.6 degrees Celsius
Science and Technology Log
Marie Martin, the bird watcher, came rushing down from her perch on the flying bridge in the early afternoon announcing that she had just spotted a humpback whale close by. We all rushed here and there to get a view. I went up to the bow and looked for about 10 minutes. As I came back through the bridge LT(jg) Mark Frydrych, the OOD (Officer of the Deck), and Marie were talking about a right whale entangled in a net. Mark called the captain seeking his advice. Whenever a situation like this is observed the captain is expected to report it. The captain told Mark to report it and let the trained people steam out to try to find it. I interjected that I never did spot the pilot whale. Everyone said, “What pilot whale?” Mark said he saw a right whale. Marie piped up that she had said it was a humpback whale. Then I remembered that indeed she had said humpback whale. At that point the whole thing was moot because the humpbacks are not endangered. Then we asked Mike, the chief scientist, what would happen if a right whale got caught in his net. He said he didn’t want to think about it. When a sturgeon got caught he said he had two weeks of doing nothing but filling out forms. If a right whale got caught he would probably have 2 months of paperwork.
NOAA Teacher at Sea
Marilyn Frydrych
Onboard NOAA Ship Delaware II September 15-25, 2008
Mission: Atlantic Herring Hydroacoustic Survey Geographical area of cruise: New England Coastal Waters Date: September 23, 2008
Weather Data from the Bridge
42.42 degrees N, 67.39 degrees W
Cloudy with wind out of the N at 32 knots
Dry Bulb Temperature: 15.5 degrees Celsius
Wet Bulb Temperature: 11.6 degrees Celsius
Waves: 6 feet
Visibility: 10 miles
Science and Technology Log
Yesterday we were fairly busy doing CTD casts and trawls. Today we woke to find the night crew just starting to record the lengths and weights of their large catch. We grabbed some cereal and took over from them at 5:45 a.m. They had collected and sorted all the fish. Jacquie and I took about two hours measuring, weighing, and examining the innards of the half basket of herring they left us. Our chief scientist, Dr. Mike Jech, summarized his findings so far in a short report to everyone including those back at Woods Hole: “Trawl catches in the deeper water near Georges Bank have been nearly 100% herring with some silver hake. Trawl catches in shallow water (<75 m) have occasionally caught herring, but mostly small silver hake, redfish, butterfish, and red hake.
A night haul of herring. Notice the brilliant blue stripe on the top of the herring. The camera’s flash is spotlighted in the reflective tape on the life vests.
Small being less than 5-6 cm in length. We caught one haddock this entire trip. Trawl catches north of Georges Bank have been a mix of redfish and silver hake, with a few herring mixed in.” This afternoon the Officer of the Deck, LT(jg) Mark Frydrych, gave me a run down of many of the instruments on the bridge. I spotted a white blob on the northeastern horizon and pointed it out. He showed me where it was on the SIMRAD FS900, a specialized radar. The SIMRAD FS900is often able to identify a ship and its name. This time it couldn’t. Looking through binoculars we could see it was a large container vessel. Then we looked at a different radar and saw both the ship’s absolute trajectory and its trajectory relative to the Delaware 2. It was on a path parallel to the Delaware2 so Mark didn’t worry about it intersecting our path. We also noticed another ship off to the west and north of us on the radar, but we couldn’t yet see it on the horizon. It too was projected on a path parallel to us.
Then Mark pointed out an area on the SIMRAD FS900 outlined in red. It’s an area where ships can voluntarily slow to 10 knots in an effort to avoid collisions with whales. It seems that sleeping right whales don’t respond to approaching noises made by ships. There are only about 350 to 500 of them left and they are often killed by passing ships. The Delaware 2 was steaming at about 7 knots because in the 6 ft waves it couldn’t go any faster. However the container ship was steaming at 15.5 knots. Few ships slow down in the red zone.
Mark showed me how to fill out the weather report for that hour. I typed in all my info into a program on a monitor which assembled all my weather data into the format the weather service uses. I first recorded our position from an instrument displaying the latitude and longitude right there above the plotting table. I read the pressure, the wet bulb temperature and the dry bulb temperature from an instrument which had a readout in a room off to the starboard of the bridge. The ship has two anemometers so I averaged these to get the wind speed and direction. We looked at the waves and tried to imagine standing in the trough of one and looking up. I figured the wave would be over my head and so estimated about 6 feet. We also looked at the white foam from a breaking wave and counted the seconds from when it appeared until it rode the next wave. The period of the wave we watched was four seconds. Next we looked out the window to search out any clouds. It was clear in front of us but quite cloudy all behind us. I estimated the height of the clouds. I typed all this information into the appropriate boxes on the monitor. It was all so much easier than my college days when we had to gather the information manually then switch it by hand into the code appropriate for the weather service. The OOD sent this information to NOAA Weather Service on the hour, every hour operations permitting.
Personal Log
Though my son was instrumental in persuading me to apply for the Teacher-at-Sea position I haven’t seen much of him thus far. He’s standing the 1 to 4 shift both afternoon and night. When I’m free he seems to be sleeping. We don’t even eat meals together. That’s why I made a special trip to the bridge today to meet up with him during his watch.
NOAA Teacher at Sea
Marilyn Frydrych
Onboard NOAA Ship Delaware II September 15-25, 2008
Mission: Atlantic Herring Hydroacoustic Survey Geographical area of cruise: New England Coastal Waters Date: September 22, 2008
Weather Data from the Bridge
42.52 degrees N, 68.06 degrees W
Cloudy, wind out of the E at 11 knots
Dry Bulb Temperature: 15.2 degrees Celsius
Wet Bulb Temperature: 14.0 degrees Celsius
Waves: 1 foot
Visibility: 10 miles
Sea Surface Temperature: 16.9 degrees Celsius
Science and Technology Log
Today was more of the same–more CTD’s and trawls. Just after lunch we had our weekly fire drill. This time the fire was in the galley and Jon Rockwell, the chief cook, was supposedly overcome with fake CO2 smoke. After everyone except Jon was accounted for the search for him began in earnest. The Hollywood style smoke machine produced smoke so thick the crew had difficulty finding Jon “passed out” on the floor of the galley. Part of the drill was lifting Jon on a stretcher up the stairs and out onto the fantail. Our station was redirected to the bridge this time where we were allowed to listen as LT(jg) Mark Frydrych conducted the exercise. I had noticed emergency firemen gear here and there in the halls. Always there was a radio charging next to the gear. That’s how they communicated. All in all I was very impressed with the expertise and calmness of everyone even when plan A didn’t work and plan B had to be tried. Safety always came first. For a good 45 minutes following the drill the crew and officers talked over possible improvements. There was no messing around. Everyone was in earnest and aware of the seriousness of the drill and the debriefing. Yet this group had been practicing fire drills weekly every time they were at sea.
Personal Log
I already knew three people aboard when I arrived. My son, LT(jg) Mark Frydrych, was the Operations Officer. He’s the one who suggested I apply for the Teacher-at-Sea position. On a previous visit to Woods Hole I had met Erin Earley, the engineer wiper. We had hit it off then and continued to get to know each other better on this cruise. Then there was my hiking pal from Colorado, Jacquie. She and I both work at Pikes Peak Community College in the math department. She’d taken the semester off and was looking for an adventure. After applying for the Teacher-at-Sea position I learned that the Herring Legs needed volunteers. Jacquie signed up for the first two legs. This cruise was her second leg. I experienced a tremendously easy adjustment stage because of these friendships.
NOAA Teacher at Sea
Marilyn Frydrych
Onboard NOAA Ship Delaware II September 15-25, 2008
Mission: Atlantic Herring Hydroacoustic Survey Geographical area of cruise: New England Coastal Waters Date: September 21, 2008
Weather Data from the Bridge
42.00 degrees, 68.06 degrees W
Partly cloudy, wind out of the SE at 6 knots
Dry Bulb Temperature: 18.0 degrees Celsius
Wet Bulb Temperature: 15.7 degrees Celsius
Waves: 1 foot
Visibility: 10 miles
Sea Surface Temperature: 17.7 degrees Celsius
Red Fish waiting to be sorted and later in a clothes basket.
Science and Technology Log
We returned to a spot that Mike had marked on our computers as a place where he would have liked to have sampled the fish when the seas were high and we were unable to fish. We sent down a CTD at dawn and then deployed our net. I’m learning more about the importance of the man at the helm. If he speeds the boat then the net will rise. Conversely, if he slows the net falls. The desire of the scientist is to get a representative sample of the fish in the area, but not to take more than what is needed since we return very few alive to the ocean. The NOAA Corps officer at the helm knows this as well and has his own sonar so that he knows at what level the fish are located. He adjusts the speed of the boat as he sees fit to catch an appropriate number of fish while checking with the chief scientist or watch chief to ensure the net is where they want it. I also learned that red fish are often associated with American herring. Red fish are a sweet delicious fish, which were over fished during World War II. They’ve been on the US’s banned fishing list since that time.
We brought up in today’s catch about 200 small fry red fish. We also collected about 20 good-sized ones running to about 12”. The large ones take up to 60 years to grow to the size where they are worth harvesting to eat. We only brought up 5 herring. This time there was one 8” squid. We deployed the Tow Body this afternoon around 3:30 p.m. It’s an undersea camera. Unfortunately the wires connecting the Tow Body to the computers had gotten broken as it sat on the fantail. Possibly the wires got jostled during clean up. (We use a fire hose to clean the fantail after each trawl.) Possibly people stepping on and over the wires as they walked about on the fantail broke the wire. This wasn’t learned until moments before we were to deploy the instrument. The ET specialist, Dave Miles, figured out where the wire was broken fairly quickly and reconnected it. That gave us connectivity, but still there was a problem of the Tow Body not responding to commands from the computer. The chief scientist, Mike, tackled that part of the problem. Somehow he fixed the software. We got the go ahead signal about three hours later.
Getting ready to deploy the Tow Body
This was the only deployment in which the scientific crew was allowed on the fantail as part of the deployment. Like the fishermen we had to wear a life jacket and hardhat. Four of us held onto lines that kept the Tow Body from twisting as it entered the water. Unfortunately one of the lines got loose. Displaying great skill fisherman Jim Pontz used a grappling hook to retrieve it. By now we had drifted so far off course we had to circle back into position. When we finally got the instrument in the water our fish had left the area. We could tell that by the echograms. The plans were to leave the Tow Body’s lights off until the camera was surrounded by fish.
Otherwise the fish swim away from the lights. Only later when we again came into a school of fish did we learn that the lights weren’t responding. The endeavor was aborted. From a scientific standpoint we did learn something. The Tow Body needed more work. We also learned that we should start disconnecting the wires from the Tow Body when it’s stored on the fantail.
Personal Log
I watched the Broncos play this afternoon. No one else was interested. Four or five of the crew watched different football games throughout the day. They seemed to have time for their favorite team, but no one seemed to spend hours and hours watching game after game. The most popular form of relaxation was watching movies. There must be over a hundred DVD’s to choose from. The screen is a large flat panel screen.
Jim Pontz using the grappling hook to retrieve a loose line.
