Category: R/V Atlantis Page 1 of 9

The Atlantis left Norfolk last Saturday morning, and we have now been at sea for roughly one week. So far, it has been an incredible experience, and I have already learned a tremendous amount!

Before leaving port, the Alvin team and I had the opportunity to tour the USS New Jersey, a Virginia class nuclear submarine. Unfortunately, we were not allowed to take any photos, but it was one of the most impressive pieces of engineering I have ever seen.

While still in Norfolk, I was able to observe the mechanical team assembling two Alvin motors that had recently arrived from the shore-based engineering crew. They also showed me the oil compensation system and explained how it prevents electrical housings from collapsing under the immense pressure. Nick, the mechanical lead, gave me a tour of both Alvin and the Atlantis, and everyone on board was incredibly welcoming and eager to help me understand the vehicle and its systems.

As we departed port, we got to see a pod of dolphins following the ship. We also passed Naval Station Norfolk and saw several impressive Navy vessels, including the USS Nimitz and USS Harry S. Truman.

Since departing, I have spent most of my time assisting with Alvin launch and recovery operations. I’ve helped prepare the tool basket, clean the submarine, and load and unload equipment from the sub. Scott and Janna also taught me how to prepare, install, and remove the MISO cameras, so I have been helping with that every day as well.

A few days ago, I had the opportunity to ride in the small boat with Esteban during a launch. Being in the small boat really put into perspective just how far from shore we are. The experience felt surreal.

Molly has also been teaching me various sailor’s knots, and Catfish showed me how to handle the stern line during small boat deployments. It made me feel like a pirate. 

Post recovery, I have started helping the science team assemble and set up push cores. It has been a good time to talk to various scientists and learn what they are doing and why. There is an artist onboard who has been making interpretative paintings of the science going on and I’ve been able talk to her about her work and how she is turning hardcore science into something palatable for a general audience.

Other than that, I’ve been hanging out in Top Lab with Nick, Bruce, and Kaitlyn since it’s quiet up there and has a nice view. It gives me the opportunity to ask them questions and learn more about everything that is going on.

The food is extremely tasty on board, and the crew have been watching old school Star Trek during meals, which has also been entertaining. The sunrises and sunsets are beautiful, and a few people have mentioned that the stars at night are really pretty, so I will go out tonight to take a look, and the results will be in next week’s blog, so come back for that.

Thanks for reading!

– Aarav

Hello!

My name is Aarav Shah and I am the UNOLS intern aboard the R/V Atlantis for the Joye Cruise! I am scheduled to be sailing out of Norfolk this Wednesday (8/26) to study methane seepage in the Atlantic with HOV Alvin for about 3 weeks.

I’m a rising sophomore at the University of Washington studying Electrical Engineering and have an interest in marine sciences and technology. At UW, I am part of the Underwater Remotely Operated Vehicle Team that competes in the MATE ROV competition which also grew my interest in underwater vehicles and research.

This will be my first time aboard a research vessel but I’m really looking forward to the experience and meeting everyone on board!

– Aarav

Hello everyone,

This week I finished up my last days at sea, transiting from Astoria, Oregon, to San Diego, California. We had some Woods Hole donors join us in place of the scientists so they could see the vessel and Alvin. We also had another cookout on deck to enjoy the weather since we were making pretty good time to port.

Transit work wasn’t quite as fun as the dive days; we’ve been packing nearly everything from the ship, including the hold, for offload. The amount of equipment the team keeps on board is astounding—and everything has oil on it. So, I did some of the not-so-glamorous but completely necessary work of cleaning various valves and hardware so they could be neatly packed and shipped back to Massachusetts for the maintenance period. Since the work has been a little slow with all the packing, I got a tour of the engine room with the donors. It was fascinating to see all the machinery the ship uses to operate and the power required to run science operations. Apparently, the ship had been recently refurbished, which involved swapping the engines. To do this, they cut a hole in the hull of the vessel and rewelded it. It now uses two primary diesel engines to run electric motors. During the maintenance, the ship replaced six generators with four newer ones and implemented a single bus bar for redundancy and engine efficiency. During this time, they also added a bow thruster.

One of the highlights during the transit was seeing a pod of hundreds of dolphins swimming next to the ship and at the bow—seriously, I have never seen so many dolphins at once! As we were all on the bow enjoying the view of the sunset and wildlife, a SpaceX rocket was launched, which we had a perfect view of. It was truly an amazing evening and one of my top memories from the cruise.

We arrived in port at 9:30 a.m. at Scripps. It was, again, super cool to see the docking process. Just as before, a pilot came aboard to help the captain navigate the channel, but what made this unique was how the ship was maneuvered. Due to a bend in the channel, the captain sailed the ship so that the bow was nearly perpendicular to the dock—only about 30 feet away—and then used the bow thruster to turn on a dime, almost 360 degrees. It was impressive. Since there’s a Navy base near port, we also saw a huge aircraft carrier go by on the way in, along with several jets taking off.

This is my first time on the West Coast, so after work I’ve been making an effort to explore. I went out for sushi with some members of the team and walked a beautiful path along the water to get there. I’ll definitely be doing some more exploring as I wrap up the internship—with only one week left.

Talk soon,
Katie

San Diego is here, and compared to the relative slowness and lull of the transit leading up to our arrival (we were out of packing boxes halfway through and couldn’t really get much offloading work done after that) I’m glad that things have started to pick up. We’ve been flitting around packing oceanographic instruments and Alvin hardware into shipping containers to be hauled off by the ship cranes.

On our way to port we spotted what I assume is a SpaceX rocket launching Starlink sattellites from the Vandenberg Space Force Base in Santa Barbara. I’m pretty sure I heard the sonic boom go off as it was going into orbit. It was a neat coincidence that we were at the right place at the right time when this happened.

The captain and the chief mate let me pilot the ship for a little while which was a lot more difficult and nervewracking than I thought it would be. You can control the Z-drives that rotate the propellers 360 degrees from the ship’s bridge, and you have to manage your speed of rotation by angling them just right so that you can get to where you’re going. There’s a lot of things to keep track of, and even when you point the vessel in the right direction it’s easy for a large wave or swell to start pushing you slightly off course. Changing the rate of rotation isn’t super responsive either, so you have to be very careful not to turn too quickly and overshoot. I had fun though! It was an excellent experience.

In the San Diego port, there seems to be a navy dolphin training facility next to us, which is crazy because I genuinely thought they stopped training dolphins for military purposes after the Cold War. I assumed it was military dolphins anyway, considering the entire region south of us is a naval base and I literally saw dolphins hop around in these little sectioned-off areas in the facility. Insane.

After we fully docked, it was actually time to get to work for once. There was a lot of Alvin paraphernalia we had to haul on shore such as the two lead-acid batteries in the vehicle (as well as the one spare in our battery hold), various cargo containers full of cameras, scientific equipment, lights, metal frames and hardware, and more.

I did also get to explore San Diego a bit. The view from our dock is already pretty good, and the crew and I have gone into the neighboring towns and downtown districts a few times after work just to see what’s out there. It does take around 15 minutes by car to go downtown and we don’t have a lot of rental cars available, so going there is mostly reserved to special occasions or weekends. I can confirm Mexican food down here is as good as they say it is.

I don’t really have much more to say about our work since it is mostly just packing and shipping of various items until the finish line, but I’ll keep you all updated if anything of note occurs. Look forward to my final post (or penultimate post? It’s unclear).

Cheers!

Aidan

Hello everyone,
This week has still been exciting even with the conclusion of all our dives. The ship still had some mapping routes to finish before we returned to port in Astoria, Oregon. During that time, we prepared for offload. Offload occurs once every five years, when Alvin, essential equipment, and parts are removed from the R/V Atlantis and shipped back to Woods Hole, Massachusetts, for maintenance and any planned upgrades.

As a mechanical intern, I spent two days draining all the oil from Alvin, including the compensation reservoirs. I think we drained about 70 gallons—way more than I anticipated—and it took a long time because, even though we created a vacuum to suck the oil out, we didn’t want to increase the pressure too much on the junction boxes and risk damaging them. I was also able to watch the post-dive process with one of the members of the electrical team inside the sphere, which was neat since I normally do not work with them. I did some other cleaning tasks, but the real fun of the week began when we docked in Astoria.

We went through the Columbia River Bar, which is extremely dangerous and difficult to navigate, so a pilot specifically trained to bring ships in and out of the bar was brought onboard by boat to help us safely dock. Conversely, on the way out of the Columbia a few days later, the pilot attempted to use a helicopter to get off the ship. Unfortunately, while the pilot was harnessed in and standing on the bow of the ship, the wind shifted, making it unsafe for him to continue, so he unclipped himself from the line to avoid injury. However, the pilot in the helicopter did not see him do this, so out of precaution the emergency line was cut from the helicopter. Apparently, the pilots at this location have not had to cut a line in many years, so it was a unique experience. Everyone erred on the side of caution and made all the right choices—so everyone was safe. The pilot then had to wait an hour for a vessel to come pick him up from our ship, which was still a really cool sight.

While in Astoria, the scientists hosted a science party at the Workers Tavern to thank the crew and Alvin team for collecting the data. It was a sweet gesture and a lot of fun to spend time with everyone before all the scientists left. The following day, the Alvin team all had the day off—which was wonderful. It was our first day off in weeks, so sleeping in was luxurious. Some members of the team and I went to Sunset Beach. Being from Florida, it was amazing to see mountains at the beach. It was also freezing, but I had a goal to swim in the Pacific Ocean, so I did—for about two minutes—because the water temperature was around 68°F and the rip current was strong. It was a nice change from Florida beaches; here there was so much space to walk and set up. We even stopped at a second beach where The Goonies was filmed and got to see the notorious boulder the ship sailed out from behind in the final scenes.

We proceeded to go into town for lunch before continuing our sightseeing. I went to the Astoria Column, where I climbed 186 steps for a breathtaking view. I was very lucky with our timing because, as I learned from speaking to a local named Boats, the weather had been rainy and foggy for some time and was expected to return, which would have obscured our view from the tower. At the same park, there are hiking trails, so I walked a couple of miles on one of them to reach the Cathedral Tree—a giant spruce. The weather and greenery made it a perfect hike.

Now, we are transiting from Astoria, Oregon, to San Diego, California, our final leg of the cruise. This has entailed much cleaning and packing, but I am looking forward to getting into port on the 30th.

Until next week,
Katie

Astoria has come and gone to usher in a new era! We left on the 25th and we may actually be on track to arrive earlier than expected, so we’re slowing down our transit a little just so that we get into port on the 30th as established just to avoid the logistic issues.

Astoria is a pretty nice port town all in all (plus the security at the port was slightly buffed compared to Newport’s – they actually asked for identification cards this time). It’s got a cute trolley that rolls around occasionally, a delightful sparkling lemonade at the Columbia River Coffee Roaster near port, and truly beautiful beaches. I’m told that the weather wasn’t usually as nice as it was when we were out exploring the town, so I’m glad I got to explore it in its full glory.

When I say that the beaches (specifically Sunset Beach) are beautiful, I mean they’re REALLY good. This is genuinely the most optimal place I’ve seen to run on sand – barely any people, spans for miles (probably), no sharp objects to step on, stunning view, you name it. Wish I could have gone on a couple more jogs here!

There was also a whale carcass here too. It was a little odd that there were no decomposers or flies or seagulls or anything chipping away at it, but I just assumed that it was pretty old and that the scavengers got to the good parts already. We were kind of worried about the corpse exploding from buildups of gas during decomposition (there have been several reports of this event occurring) so I observed it from a distance. Despite being decently old, it still smelled horrendous, as expected.

They have wild rabbits at Cannon Beach. I don’t mean the brown ones that graze on lawns and stuff, these ones look like people literally released the local pet shop population upon the ecosystem. Somehow they seem to be thriving – do they not have any predators in this region?? I can tell that they’re wild by the way they react to humans but they also seem very used to the presence of people. Intriguing.

Most of my actual work on the ship during our transit has been packing things up and getting ready for moving out. We started running low on crates to put supplies in, so things have been getting a little stagnant recently. I’m trying to counteract this by keeping myself busy designing printed circuit boards and having them fabricated and sent to San Diego so I can pick them up when I get there. There’s a lot of talented electrical engineers on the Alvin team that I can request advice from, so I’m grateful for this opportunity to bother them about extremely trivial KiCAD questions. I also gained a newfound hatred for tariffs.

They gave a tour of the engine room today and showed us some of the tools and equipment they use to maintain smooth operations of the ship like power distribution and propulsion. It was very interesting and yet very loud. Also smelled like chemicals.

I didn’t expect to see so much wildlife on this stretch of the trip, but so far there have been a lot of sea lions, plus several whales! The whales have been frustratingly difficult to capture on camera, so you’ll just have to excuse the cryptid-like photo of this one. If you can figure out what species this is from this image alone, tell me in the blog comments or something. I’ll be very impressed.

I think I have one or two more blog posts left in me before the internship ends. Now that the end is so close in sight, the four weeks I spent out here didn’t feel so long. I’m a little sad that it’s ending so soon now but I’ve been having a lot of fun out here. See you guys in San Diego!

Aidan

This week marked the completion of all the dives Alvin will partake in for this cruise, for a total of 10 dives. It truly was an amazing sight that I am sad to see come to an end; I felt like I was finally getting into a rhythm of completing pre- and post-dive activities somewhat independently. However, I do have many fun memories to share.

One of the highlights this week was getting another perspective of the recovery process by riding in the lifeboat that brought the swimmers to Alvin upon resurfacing. During this process, I witnessed how the swimmers contacted the pilot and observers in the sphere using a standard plug-in phone, secured the safety lines on the science basket, retrieved the tow from the stern of the ship, and swiftly attached the tow line to the sub. It was a beautiful day out on the water, and I am so grateful to the crew and Alvin team for allowing me to see this part of recovery up close. At that moment, I realized I could definitely do this as a job one day.

At the start of the week the swell picked up, which made me a little sick, but I have since acclimated and now enjoy the rocking. It can be quite fun when it gets bumpy, but I also learned how important it is to secure items even when the swell is expected to be tame. At one point, a random wave came through at just the right angle for the ship to roll significantly; I braced myself in the hangar as I watched crates of ratchet straps and hose clamps come flying out of the shelves. We made sure everything was strapped down tight after that. Otherwise, we had wonderful weather and some great sunrises and sunsets, with only a couple of rainy days.

We solved the mystery leak we were experiencing last week with the main ballast blow box—a faulty check valve! Although it passed testing, we swapped it for a ready spare and, after the following dive, there were no more leaks. The work was predominantly the same as the previous week, except for the last dive. For the final dive, we had what’s oddly called, in my opinion, a “skin party.” This is where we removed all the “skins,” or protective plating, from Alvin to be washed. It was like a car wash for a submersible and quite fun; whenever we scrub the hangar or deck we put on music, which makes it a good time.

Additionally, I learned a bit more about the sub’s navigation. The ship has piezoelectric transducers that locate the sub and then relay its position back to Alvin. Once the sub is at the bottom, it can set its current location as a reference point and use the Doppler Velocity Logger on its tail to track movements from there. I also learned about an important safety protocol: the sub must contact top lab every 30 minutes using FM frequency. If this does not happen for one hour plus the time it would take the sub to return to the surface from the designated dive location, the top lab must notify the Navy and other authorities. They have very strict regulations for diving to maintain safety.

As for the science this week, we completed a couple of lander deployments. The lander was used to collect video data of the hydrothermal vents and Alvin itself. I also spoke with some of the scientists on board and learned about their equipment. I helped set up some IGTs on the science basket, which are water samplers designed to maintain the pressure, temperature, and gas content of the sample as it was collected. Since the team is studying nitrogen cycling, they are adding tracers to these samples to understand how microorganisms process chemicals under these conditions. This may be a bit of an oversimplification—I tried my best to follow their explanations, but it’s not really my background. Apparently, IGTs are rare, with only about 20 in existence, making it a very cool sight!

Anyway, the dives are done, but I still have a few weeks left in the internship.
More to come,
Katie

We’re done with dives! Yesterday was the last Alvin dive of the cruise and we’re heading back to Astoria, Oregon to drop off the scientists before we go on our transit to San Diego for offloading. Most of the week has felt relatively routine by now – getting Alvin ready for dives in the morning, turning on various beacons and radio devices, cleaning camera lenses, refilling CO2 scrubbers, etc. so I’m going to be recapping some notable highlights. Hard to believe we’re already done with dives and switching to a new schedule right as I was getting the hang of things!

The variety of people on board the Atlantis has been pretty interesting to talk to. Since our professions and backgrounds are so different, it’s been fun to chat with scientists, maritime crew, and educators about their roles on and off the ship.

Every time Alvin returns from a dive with the bio box used for collecting organism samples, it’s always entertaining to see what fruits the depths have yielded for us that day. In this picture, they’re mostly tube worms with bacterial growths (the white fuzzy parts).

Some students from Arizonan schools have sent in decorated Styrofoam cups for the sub to bring down to the seafloor. Due to the extreme water pressure (more than 200atm at over 2000m of depth) that’s down there, the cups end up getting squashed into these cute Shrinky Dink-like crush cups. I made one for myself on Monday, and the result is in the pic below. I’m quite fond of it.

On the final dive, I got to ride on the small boat that retrieves the swimmers. It was a nice feeling to be out on the water on a smaller dinghy, and I got some new POVs of the dive procedure. All in all it was quite entertaining, and I feel like I got a better understanding of the diving process from all roles.

It’s not all work out here anyway – there’s also plenty we do to keep morale high during monotonous hours when work feels stressful. Once when the seas were calm and the sun was out, the galley moved out onto the front deck for lunch to grill burgers and hot dogs. I really wasn’t expecting something like this, so it was a nice change of pace to rewind with a soda and chat with the crew.

A silly picture of me in the sub helping pilots run end-of-cruise maintenance checks. Learning about all the procedures and failsafes built into the sub was very intriguing.

This evening, another pod of dolphins came to visit the bow of the ship again! There’s no way to really tell if they were from the same pod, but they were of the same species at least. It felt like there were a lot more than last time – I’m taking it as a sign of good luck and safe voyages seeing as they also greeted me when I came out to the ocean for the first time.

Offloading at Astoria and transit starts tomorrow, so that’s what my next update is going to be about. See you soon!

Aidan

It has been a busy second week. This week I finally got to see the launch and recovery process of Alvin, which was amazing. The weather was ideal at first, with very calm seas—almost flat for the first couple of days, which is uncharacteristic of the Juan de Fuca Ridge. Later on, the swell returned to double digits, which took some getting used to. Nevertheless, I had the opportunity to get my hands dirty with the pre- and post-dive operations alongside the mechanical team.

Most mornings during pre-dive, I helped flush the lines of any air or water with either Carnation, hydraulic, or Brey oil, depending on the system. This ensures proper pressure compensation in the junction boxes that house the electronics for the ballast systems, communications, etc. Brey oil, I learned, is used instead of Carnation to prevent arcing in electrical boxes that draw more current. I also helped load the sub after the pilot finished their pre-dive checks inside the sphere. During this time, I handed down CO₂ scrubbers, towels to remove condensation, blankets for comfort (since it gets quite cold), and lunch for the pilot and observers.

The sphere is very well taken care of. Before each dive, all passengers must shower and wear clothing made of natural fibers to ensure safety. Synthetic materials can be flammable and may wedge themselves in the window seals, which play a crucial role in maintaining the pressure boundary. Even when the hatch is inspected in the morning, the person conducting the inspection must be free of oil and dirt to maintain cleanliness. After the sub is launched, we scrub the hangar and refill the oil containers so that everything is ready for any evening maintenance.

Post-dive operations can be a little fast-paced. As soon as the Launch Coordinator indicates the sub is secured on deck, we quickly rinse down the entire sub to prevent corrosion, cover the windows, and remove access panels to begin inspections. I always do a general “mech inspection,” which involves walking around the sub and checking for any loose bolts, wiring, or abnormalities. This past week we had water intrusion issues with the port main ballast blow box. We spent a few late nights draining and pressure testing the box, as well as testing the check valve and bladder for leaks. Unfortunately, we still haven’t found the culprit, but hopefully by the next update I’ll have an answer.

Additionally, there was water in the port thruster—which is bad, but also good for me, because I got to help take it apart. First, we swapped the motor for a ready spare so the sub was dive-ready, then made the repairs. We drained the motor of hydraulic oil, replaced a damaged O-ring and crane seal, and then carefully refilled the motor. This was fun but tedious, since every bit of air introduced into the system has to be removed. You wouldn’t think it would be much, but it is—so we had to slowly fill the motor using a tube while shaking it to release all the air.

All in all, it was a great week. I was able to watch the recovery process from the bridge and see the captain’s role in retrieving the sub, and I even got to check out some of the critters scientists collected in a bio box from the hydrothermal vents!

Until next time,
Katie

It feels kind of odd to say that it’s only been two weeks since I left, but I found that being on a vessel tends to screw up your sense of time. I’m sure the other members of the crew agree with me.

We’ve had a total of five dives so far, and dredged up plenty of interesting things. The dives for yesterday and the day before were cancelled due to unfavorable weather conditions, but it went somewhat back to normal today so we got to have a pilot-in-training dive, albeit the deployment was later than usual.

There’s a wide variety of samples that we collect on this specific cruise – sometimes we take water samples of the hydrothermal vents using isobaric gas-tight samplers (IGTs) which help keep contents pressurized when the scientists are doing experiments on the nitrogen-cycling properties of the microbes in the water. Sometimes we also bring up freaky little creatures like tube worms and this scale worm in the picture below!

Depending on what kind of samples we want to collect, naturally we would have to change tools for the job. The basket in front of the HOV Alvin typically holds all the equipment needed to complete the dive objectives of the science team for a dive, and it is our duty as the maintainers and technicians of Alvin to swap these out as needed per dive.

As an intern, my daily routine usually consists of getting up early start helping the team with pre-dive checks – making sure that cameras are striped, calibrated and properly cleaned, ensuring parts on the HOV are secured, refilling CO2 scrubbers, etc. We roll Alvin out on the tracks leading to the A-Frame at the aft of the ship, where we attach stacks of ballasting weights to it and put the pilot and observers in before we send it into the water.

Once the HOV is in the water, swimmers on a smaller boat will go to it and do some last minute checkups like unhooking safety lines and verifying communications are good to go. The phone the swimmers use to talk to the passengers of the sub is actually not waterproof, so while they’re verifying comms they also have to be very careful not to get it wet. The design is kind of counterintuitive, but the fact that the phone does not need to be powered independently makes the drawbacks worth it. Still, it is pretty comedic to see the swimmers make their way back to the little boat raising what looks like an old landline phone above them the whole time.

After the sub goes down, we have someone in the top lab to monitor GPS position and to maintain communications with it every so often. Us interns usually take this time to clean up our messes from the morning of deployment, and then it’s time to muck around until we get the signal to get ready for retrieval.

During retrieval, we finish up with post-dive tasks like hosing down the sub to wash off the saltwater and securing him back in the hangar for safety and in case bad weather starts rocking the boat around. We usually get some sort of report from the pilot about equipment or components that didn’t work so well and may need to be fixed or replaced, and our evenings are pretty much occupied with post-dive and fixing up the sub for tomorrow’s dive.

Of course, if the weather conditions are unsafe for swimmers or pilots we may have to call off some of our dive days. The swells were pretty big yesterday and the day before that, and we used the time not diving to finish up any maintenance that we’ve been putting off – fixing of lasers, replacement of important wires to the propellers that route inside the sub, things like that.

I’m learning lots of things out here. I haven’t needed to do any of this in my daily work, but the crew and the Alvin team taught me a whole array of knot-tying techniques which I’m sure is going to come in handy someday…? During downtime I also try to see what the other departments are up to, like bothering the scientists in the lab to find out what they’re doing with the water samples we bring them, or pestering the bridge about navigation. It’s been lots of fun, but it’s also starting to feel like I already spent a month or two at sea. Time is not real on this vessel.

I’ll be back next week.

Aidan