2 weeks already—it’s a little hard to believe. We’ve been at sea for just about a week so far, and the transit has been great. We haven’t hit any patches of rough weather, and it’s starting to get a lot warmer too. The ocean has been choppy for most of the week, and the motion took some getting used to, but otherwise I’ve felt quite good this whole trip. Part of that is definitely because of our stewards; the food has honestly been amazing so far (to my surprise). One more week until Cape Verde!

Our biggest project since my last post has been our work on the digibirds. As a marine seismology vessel, the Langseth uses two key tools to gather seismic data while at sea. The first of these tools are our four airguns: sources that release soundwaves into the ocean that bounce off different layers of rock and sediment below the seafloor. The second of these tools are our streamers: four 15km long seismic hydrophone cables that float behind the research vessel listening for the returning soundwaves. Together, they allow researchers to gather 2D and 3D images of the ocean floor and the features beneath it. The digibirds themselves are devices that attach to the streamers that allow us to remotely monitor and control the position of the cables in the water column. Using the digibirds, we can keep the streamers at a specific depth and at a specific distance from one another, allowing us to gather more precise seismic data. The ones on the ship have been through a lot of wear and tear, so our job repairing them is critical for the ship’s ongoing research.

Over the course of this past week, Will and I have worked through about 60 digibirds. They’ve come with all sorts of issues: incorrect depth indicators, poor wing movement, broken motors, bad electrical systems, and even physical damage. For each bird, we’ve had to test thefunctionality of each system and identify what we can actually fix and what has to be sent back to LDEO. We calibrate the depth systems and test the movement of the wings, and if either of those fail we replace the wing module with one we know is functional. If either of those tests fail again, we know we have an issue with the bird itself, and not just the sensors. For the most part, however, we’ve been able to fix the birds up just by replacing or tweaking the wing module before recalibrating all systems. Definitely a cool hands-on mechanical and data-driven experience to have under my belt!

While that was definitely our biggest project this week, it wasn’t the only thing we did. One of our daily tasks at sea has been monitoring the echosounder and multibeam data streams and outputs. These are essentially the same device, except they output in 2D and 3D respectively, with the echosounder measuring the depth directly beneath the ship and the multibeam mapping underwater topography. We’ve learned how they function and how to read/analyze their data outputs, which will be super valuable for future projects. Other electronic systems we’ve worked on this week aboard the Langseth include installing a monitor displaying our sonar system power information, designing junction box schematics, and troubleshooting the AML SVP. This last device is used to measure the speed of sound in a given location and standardizes the measurements of our multibeam systems. It sits below the ship’s hull and has swappable attachments to measure temperature, salinity, pressure, and more. All in all, I’ve learned a lot this week, and I know there is much more to come!