Month: March 2020

Week 2: First time out

On March 10, 2020

In MATE Blog Archive, R/V F.G. Walton Smith, University of Miami/RSMAS

We spent the week getting ready to take a group of students and professors out. We finished up all the projects we had been working on. We got the CTD prepped on Thursday. Then did a wet test on friday. It was my first time deploying the CTD. It went pretty smoothly, and was great practice for when we would do it for real. While we were doing our prep I got to see a few manatees. They like to spend time in the area we are docked.

We started around 8am Saturday morning. I helped the engineer get the engine fired up. We also setup the generators and took out the shore power. We went about 8 miles offshore, and dropped the CTD in to get some samples. The seas were pretty rough, but it still went really well. We ended up doing 2 different CTD deployments throughout the day. We also deployed two different nets to collect micro plastics and we dragged another to collect plankton. After we finished collecting the samples we headed back to port. On the way we saw a pod of dolphins ride the bow wake. We will do another similar trip Sunday as well.

Week 5: Smooth Seas Do Not Make Skillful Sailors

By Kaitlyn Beardshear

On March 8, 2020

In MATE Blog Archive, R/V Atlantis, Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution

We’re traveling up the east coast now. During one of the previous dives, one of the sub’s pumps had a water leak. I got to put a new one on the sub and clean up the previous one. We stopped in Florida to swap out some of the science party, then headed north. We ran into a few days of bad weather, which on top of making a lot of people sick, delayed the dives. Four days with not much to do but watch movies. It sounds like fun but after the third or fourth terrible movie that someone else put on, it’s almost tempting to throw myself off the boat just for something to do. When we finally got the weather to calm down enough, we got one short dive in. As we continue to head north, we’re going to hit even more bad weather. We’ll see what happens to the other dives on this cruise.

via GIPHY

Week 1: Welcome to Bermuda

By Bailey Armos

On March 7, 2020

In Bermuda Institute of Ocean Sciences & Arizona State University, MATE Blog Archive, R/V Atlantic Explorer

My first week here in Bermuda is already coming to an end. I arrived at BIOS Monday afternoon after a overnight flight. BIOS is home to the Bermuda Atlantic Time-Series Study (BATS) where they use the R/V Atlantic Explorer to collect oceanographic data every month.

Pictured below is the R/V Atlantic Explorer at sunset. The weather has been windy but otherwise pretty nice.

I spent most of the week getting acquainted with the boat and the marine tech world. I was assigned little projects and reading to get me up to speed with some of the technology and equipment that I am unfamiliar with. It is exciting to be learning new skills that will benefit my career in the long term!

One of the little projects I am working on is simplifing and organinzing the ship’s media storage which meant opening hard drive cases and moving files between the different hard drives.

I am excited to continue learning new aspects of this exciting career and getting to go out to sea in a week!

Week 4: Work, Work, Work

By Kaitlyn Beardshear

On March 1, 2020

In MATE Blog Archive, R/V Atlantis, Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution

We are back out in the Gulf of Mexico. This cruise there’s another intern in the Alvin group that I have a lot in common with (video games, it’s video games). It’s been a lot of fun having someone around my age to hang out with while we work. Right after we got into the Gulf, we had a day with some less than optimal weather and the dive was canceled. It was quite an experience to look out a window and have the view shift from being all water, to all sky, back to all water. Another day the sub had to come out early as the wind had been building up.

The days feel like they last forever. I get up early, help launch the sub, read in my time off, help recover the sub, help fix anything that was broken during the dive, go to bed, and do it all again the next day. It’s a lot but I’m really enjoying myself out here especially working with the electronics techs. I took a test to be a maintenance technician and I passed! Now I’m allowed to sign off on my work. It’s weird to think that we only have 5 dives left and in 2 weeks we’ll be in Woods Hole.