And we're off!

Hi there! This is Sarah, one of the education and outreach staff at NANOOS. Amy and I are underway on the R/V Thomas Thompson, University of Washington’s research vessel (abbreviated R/V). This is my first time aboard a ship on an overnight trip, and I am excited to share my experience with you! Please let us know if you have any questions in the comments section, and Amy and I will try to answer them at least once a day. Internet is via satellite and tends to be spotty, so we will do our best. Also, if you have questions for scientists, let us know and we will track down some answers.  

We boarded at 8:00am and the Thompson set sail at 9:00am. The Thompson dock is at the University of Washington, and it took us about an hour and a half to reach the Ballard Locks. At the Locks, we moved from freshwater on the east side to saltwater on the west side. Soon after we went thought the Locks lunch was served at 11:30am: sushi, steamed mussels, noodle salad, chicken with peanut sauce, and Thai soup. Yum! Food was amazing. After lunch we practiced safety drills and had a science team meeting with all the science-related crew onboard. 

We have four lead scientists onboard: Chief Scientist Matthew Alford, who is the lead scientist on the cruise and is in charge of deploying the Cha’ba buoy and is collecting data about internal waves; Jan Newton, who is collecting water quality data and samples at several stations along the Strait of Juan de Fuca as part of the PRISM project; John Mickett who is also involved with the Cha’ba buoy; and Parker MacCready, who will be using the internal wave data collected on this cruise in numerical models. Other additional scientists include: Stephanie Moore from the NOAA Northwest Fisheries Science Center who studies Harmful Algal Blooms (HABs) and is specifically looking at the relationship between HABs and ocean acidification; and Cynthia Peacock from the NOAA Pacific Marine Environmental Lab (PMEL) who is collecting ocean acidification related data. 

On our way out to the Cha’ba buoy site we are making stops in the Strait to collect PRISM cruise data. Since it takes 12 hours to get to the buoy site from Seattle, PRISM cruise sampling is taking place from 1:30pm today (Monday) and is going through the night until 6:30am. Jan recruited volunteers to help with the sampling, and we have been split into 3 shifts: 1:30pm-6:30pm; 6:30pm-midnight; and midnight-6:30am. Amy lucked out with an afternoon shift, and I am looking forward to working the midnight to 6:30am shift that I got assigned. Luckily there is coffee available 24hours a day, so I will be using that as a lifeline. I do not envy Jan, who will probably stay up all night long. 

The data collected for the PRISM cruises includes physical (temperature and salinity), chemical (dissolved oxygen and nutrients), and biological (phytoplankton). Temperature, salinity, oxygen and chlorophyll are collected by a mechanical sensor package called a CTD, which stands for Conductivity-Temperature-Depth. Oxygen, nutrients, and phytoplankton are collected by processing water collected by bottles at pre-specified depths. Tall water collection tubes surround the CTD and are set up so that they can be triggered by a computer onboard to close the top and bottom caps. This traps the water from certain depths allowing scientists to compare water characteristics throughout the entire water column. The NOAA Fisheries and PMEL scientists are also taking water samples from these bottles for their research.

Right now it is a little before 6:30pm and we just finished up with the second PRISM station, which is located just north of Port Angeles. The views are outstanding: to the south are the Olympics, northeast Mt Baker is out, north of us are the San Juan (US) and Gulf (Canada) Islands, and to the west is a hint of the Pacific Ocean. Since I am on duty for the midnight shift, I am signing off to get some rest and hopefully sleep before my shift.

Edit: It is now 5:30am, and I've been up since 11:30pm. Internet was down before I hit the hay at 7:30pm, so after working through the night doing CTD casts and filtering water samples for chlorophyll, I've finally gotten a chance to sit down and post this. Morale is still high, and we are currently on site for the Cha'ba buoy deployment. The folks involved with the Cha'ba buoy started wandering around at about 4:30-5am, and are now out on deck getting the buoy ready to hit the water. We'll be taking video of the process, but because of the internet speed, probably won't get a chance to upload that until after we get back to shore at the end of the week. I'll also work on uploading some photos soon as well. Happy Tuesday, everyone!