After returning and demobilizing from our mooring cruise, we set sail for an overnight trip on Hydrostaion. For anyone who is not familiar with Hydro station in Bermuda, it is an ocean data time-series established in 1954, which provides long-term data for the open ocean of Bermuda. For decades, Hydrostation and BATS (a sister station) have been a pinnacle research program in Bermuda.The cruise was short and involved only a few CTD casts.
After our overnight trip, we docked off station at Penos in St. Georges, Bermuda. We remained off station for five days. During our stay at the docks, we received fall and safety training. The training covered the varying marine hazards, safety procedures, equipment, and field training. During field training, we dressed in our ship’s harnesses and practiced being suspended from cranes and climbing the mast. The experience was a blast and another training I can put under my belt!
During training, we were suspended. Using our pulley system on our crane, we attached a rope to the harness back D-ring and were suspended several times for practice.
Using lanyards, the yellow attachment device on the mast rung, we practiced climbing our mast- a job I may be required to do as a marine tech.
After fall and safety training, we made our way back to the BIOS docks where we met with IT supervisor, Mark Jolly, to troubleshoot our shore-ship wi-fi connection. For several weeks now, our shore to ship connection has been down. Weeks prior, I spent days terminating all our wifi cables, reconnecting, tracing cables and shore-boxes with no luck. After working with Mark, we realized a cable on our ship’s wifi switch had gone bad and was not receiving sufficient signals. After swapping it out, and connecting our switch, we regained our shore wifi- which was very happy news for all the crew who was having difficulty getting internet access. While shore connection is down, or rather- we go out to sea, we rely on satellite internet. And while our satellite internet is good quality, high internet traffic can easily clutter it up.
All in all, I had a great experience docking at Penos in St. Georges. The area is beautiful and only a two minute walk into town! I am very thankful to be in a place as beautiful as Bermuda.