Day 12 - The Antarctic Shelf...at last!
There is something exciting about throwing an expensive piece of kit over the side and hoping it comes back. Emboldened by the previous day’s success
and a further calming of the weather, we continue to deploy the VMP and measure
turbulence rates. It is quite fun for most of us (well, for those of
us whose kit it isn’t…). When at the surface, it begins pinging signals back
and forth. We all run to the main bridge and look out for a little fluorescent
flag and a flashing light. Sometimes a bird, hoping it has just found a feed,
helps us out. Then we have the fun job of hooking the floating instrument as it
passes by. It is a bit like a combination of jousting and fishing.
Photo: Gwen the scientists and much of the crew's eyes are in demand.
Photo: "Hey! You're not an Albatross"
Photo: Gwyn and James go fishing for VMPs
We have only been at see 9 days, but for
the CTD crew, the monotony is beginning to wear:
Get up
Chat to Brian at the end of his red-eye
shift
Grab a quick breakfast before his CTD comes
on board
Take water samples from the bottles
Prepare the CTD for the next deployment
Steam 20 miles to next site
Check meteorological and ongoing
measurements
Process some data
Get to station
Put CTD in water
Lower to bottom – raise to top
Take CTD out of water
…repeat
I am sure it isn’t any easier for the
chemists:
Take water from bottle
Poor water into machine that goes ping
Wait
Write down reading
Take water from bottle
Repeat…
Today however we are close to a major
milestone, we have reached the base of the Antarctic Continental Shelf. This is
where the ocean depth goes from very deep (like 3-4km) to very shallow (like
100m-200m). It signals the end of this ‘Section’ and means we will have soon
gathered enough data to estimate the strength of the
Circumpolar Current. Hopefully by the morning we will be in the shallows and
heading east to see if the ice has frozen over our moorings. And, if it has,
there will be lots of pretty icebergs, seals and penguins to look at…stay
tuned.
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