What's Happening Today - Nov. 24

The days are starting to blur together. If this is Saturday it must be ABE being charged and DSL-120A finishing a survey line - or something like that. Hans, Maurice and I have put together a plan that we think will last for more than 24 hours. Organizing the logistics for the various vehicles is no easy task, but with the help and patience of everyone on board we're managing pretty well. We've decided to optimize how often we can get ABE down to the seafloor to collect data- basically that is once every 44 hours. We've found from experience on this cruise that it takes about 3 hours for ABE to descend, 24 hours for it to run its surveys on the seafloor, around 3 hours to come back to the surface and get picked up, and 14 hours to recharge it's batteries. We're fitting all the other work in between these ABE cycles.

Tomorrow we do the last DSL-120A survey of this cruise. Everyone on board will be thrilled that we've finished with that work - from an operations perspective it's about as exciting as mowing a lawn. In fact, that's what marine geologists call mapping the seafloor along parallel tracks like we've been doing the past 3 weeks.

ABE Dive #58 started after dinner, right after we recovered the sonar fish. We then calibrated the Towed Camera THING lens to find out how big the image area is at 5 meters altitude. Andy Billings came through again with a nifty set of measuring sticks that had 10 centimeter markings on them bound together to make a cross. He tied the cross to the camera frame with ropes that were exactly 5 meters long. The test was successful and we now know that the optics and lens on this camera yield an image that is exactly 6.4 meters across by 4.8 meters top-to-bottom.

Big News Today: Paul Johnson caught the first fish of the cruise - a nice tuna. Way to go Paul!

Best Regards,

Dan Fornari

Remember the turtle that Gary Austin caught the other day. Rhian Waller, a biologist colleague at Southampton Oceanography Centre in the UK, sent in this information. "From the 'bumps' on his caparapace, the lack of spots on his jaw and the area your in, he's probably a Ridley, though it's really difficult to tell the loggerhead and Ridley apart, the only definate way is to look on the belly. The Ridley's have a line of pores running down either side between the plates and the loggerhead doesn't." Thanks Rhian for the info. Our best guess is that it was a Ridley's turtle.

Kate Buckman (left) and Dan Fornari deploy the rock corer "Mighty Mo".

Al Bradley serenading ABE this evening before deployment. He's sending pings at specific frequencies to test ABE's navigation and control systems.

Booby patrol this evening. The moon is barely visible above the 6th bird from right. Kate Buckman took this photo.

Margo Edwards wishes her husband Roger a very Happy Birthday!

Christina Courcier, one of the SSSG techs., directing the launch of the Towed Camera THING this evening.

Akel Sterling and Jennie Morgan watching the sunset.

Sunset watch. From left: Pat Hickey, John Cawley, Andy Billings and Rod Catanach.

You can see why everyone turned out for the 'green flash' watch and sunset tonight. It was a beautiful end of the day.

More sunset worshipers. From right: Dan Fornari, Paul Johnson, Kate Buckman, and Brooke Stembridge.

Launching ABE this evening. Manny Lopes, an Ordinary Seaman is at right, Rod Catanach is looking over the rail to be sure the descent weight is OK.

Launching the THING tonight for the field-of-view test. Dave Sims, one of the SSSG techs, is handling the lines to the marked cross sticks. Christina Courcier, one of the SSSG techs is directing the launch, Andy Billings is controlling a tag line in the background.

Paul Johnson with the first fish of the cruise.

One of the calibration photos taken at 50 meters depth of the calibration cross Andy Billings made. Each dark and white band is 10 centimeters long. Each stick is 1 meter long. The cross is hanging 5 meters below the camera lens. The field of view at this distance is 6.4 meters across and 4.8 meters wide. This is the average distance that we've been towing the camera above the seafloor.

Getting the Towed Camera THING on deck after the test. Dave Sims is in the center, Andy Billings is at far left, and Dan Fornari is at right.