Slow and Steady

Pete Liarikos, bosun on the research vessel Neil Armstrong, signals to another crew member operating the ship’s crane to raise the crane’s load. Slowly. On the line are a pair of acoustic Doppler current profilers (ADCPs) being deployed off Cape Hatteras, N.C., in 2016. The instruments are designed to measure the speed and direction of water moving through the ocean. These two, one aiming up and the other down, were part of a deep-water mooring designed to monitor the ocean in a location near where the Gulf Stream turns northeast, away from the North American continent. (Photo by Pelle Robbins, Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution)