Category: R/V Marcus G. Langseth

The cruise is nearing its end, having completed six weeks of travel. On July 18, around 8 am, the crew received a radio call from the Icelandic Coast Guard about a distress signal from a vessel with a broken mast and low fuel. The Marcus G. Langseth, being the closest ship, backtracked to assist. After about five hours, the sailboat was spotted. The crew deployed a small boat to deliver multiple cans of fuel to the stranded vessel, successfully enabling it to return home safely. It appears the boat had not been ready for the harsh weather, as their sails were shredded.

Continuing on, we passed Iceland on the west and entered the Arctic Circle, where the sun never sets. However, operations were suspended for several days due to poor weather. Upon resuming, we completed work at Station 6 east of Greenland, where we observed pilot whales and retrieved a core sample containing a piece of sponge. We then headed to Station 7, the final station.

We also experienced power disruptions due to engine issues; I believe the starboard main overheated and shut down, likely due to a procedure missed as we slowed down to deploy our last Argo float. Fortunately, the engineering team resolved the issue within a couple of hours.

We are at the end of the 6 week of the this cruise and the end as whole is just around the corner. It has certainly been an eventful week. On our transit to the final station we recieved a distress signal from a vessel with a broken mast and running low on fuel. The Marcus G. Langseth was the closest ship to the distressed party and made the easy decision of changing course in order to provide assistance. After back tracking for several hours we were able to spot the small sailing vessel nested in a thick fog. The ship’s crew wasted no time in preparting to assist. They loaded up one of our small boats with fuel cans and a small party of three to meet the ship approximately a mile away from us. It is quite a process to deploy the boat and all were in attendance at the spectacle. Luckily there were no issues and the distressed vessel was able to make its way home safe.

With our own small boat and its party secured again we made for our heading towards the Arctic Circle. We passed right by Iceland on this transit and quite possibly may have seen it if the continuous fog didn’t follow us. As we passed the Arctic Circle we have truly come into a place of eternal daytime. Unfortunatley we have not been able to utilize this extra light to our advantage as we have suspened operations for several days due to the weather. Once it clears we will finish up our final station and make our way to Reykjavic for a well needed sight of land.

Daylight is lasting a lot longer than I’ve ever experienced. Sunrise starts almost the moment I’m on shift (midnight). It’s hard to claim I’m on night shift when most of my work is still being done during the day. Overall, it seems like we’re all falling into a good rhythm. Usually, around 5 am, myself and the other tech on night duty start prepping the deck and the equipment for the day. Eddy, another MATE intern, writes us notes letting us know what work was done and what work we can do.

I finally had time to hang out with the science crew while they processed their samples. Before now, all I really got to see of their work was them taking the shuttles off the multicorer and into the vans (essentially, a shipping container kept at 33-36 degrees Fahrenheit) and then coming out with the mud in small bottles. I am really thankful that they took the time to show me their work. Inside the van, they have quite a bit of dedicated equipment that allows them to remove the mud from the shuttles without the mud being exposed to air.

I also had the joy of seeing an XBT (its Nicholas name is “Expendable Bathythermograph”) deployment. It is shaped a little like a toy rocket and essentially, it is a probe that measures the temperature as it falls through the water. There is a very thin copper wire connecting the probe to the equipment on the ship. When it reports that it has reached depth, we break the wire and leave the XBT in the ocean. It is something I’ve learned about in my studies but had heard they were not used most days as they are a bit wasteful, and there are other ways to get the same data.

Station 6 was east of Greenland and we arrived on Saturday the 13^th and started coring on Sunday. One of those cores caught a piece of a sponge! We also were visited by a large pod of pilot whales on Sunday. There was a group of roughly 20 whales that were jumping and diving near the boat, and another group closer to the horizon.

Monday was a big day of coring and by Tuesday evening, we had finished the CTD cast and were headed onward towards station 7, our last station!

Usually transit days are more relaxed, but Wednesday and Thursday brought some excitement. First, we released our last Argo float on Wednesday, followed by an XBT probe to get water column temperature data from the location of deployment. XBT stands for Expendable Bathythermograph; “expendable” because the probe is launched into the water and not recovered. The probe is a small, torpedo shaped object that stays connected to the launching device by a delicate thread of copper wire which transmits the data back to the ship. Once we reach its maximum depth, you break the thin wire and are left with a temperature profile of the water column the probe fell through. XBTs are used on the Langseth for seismic, in which sound is used to map the ocean floor, and an XBT helps find the speed of sound through water, which is dependent on the salinity and temperature of the water.

A few hours later, we experienced some disruptions in power as one of the main engines had a kerfuffle. At this time, I was in the bridge and it was interesting to see how the captain and second mate managed the situation. After some troubleshooting, the engineering team were able to get everything back online.

On Thursday morning, we were notified by the Icelandic Coast Guard that we were the closest vessel to a sailing vessel in distress and asked to render aid. The sailboat lost its sails in a storm and was running out of fuel. We backtracked for a few hours until we were in sight of the sailboat. The second mate, third mate, and one AB went in the fast rescue boat to bring them jugs of fuel. It was a little unnerving to watch the little orange boat be rocked around in the cold waves, but they reached the sailboat safely twice to bring them about 50 gallons of fuel. The rest of the deck crew contributed to a successful deployment and recovery of the fast rescue boat.

Our excitement for Friday was crossing the Arctic Circle!! And it was Larkin’s (our awesome videographer/photographer/science communicator on board) birthday! We also had a meeting for planning demobilization once we reach port, which includes arranging for shipping containers, cranes, and forklifts.

We are expecting some big seas in the next few days and hopeful we still be able to find a weather window to get station 7 done before heading to Reykjavik. Home stretch!

Pod of pilot whales, photo by Lexi!

View from the bridge as the orange fast rescue boat crosses our bow.

Fast rescue boat just after it was deployed from its davit on port side.

We started week 5 by arriving to station 5, located in the central Labrador Sea between Greenland and Labrador. We sent multi-core casts all day on Monday and Tuesday, and finished up station 5 with a CTD cast on Wednesday. Sunset is getting later as we continue northward.

Scores of northern fulmars and gulls kept us company at station 5, floating and flying near the ship. Fulmars spend almost all their days at sea, so they are not typically seen from land. Another lift to ship morale were two incredible nights of having Haagen Dazs ice cream bars for dessert.

During transit on Thursday, a group of us got a tour of the engine room. We saw the massive air compressors for seismic work, as well as the engines, shaft generators, aux generator, and air conditioning systems. In addition to catching up on projects and reading, I spent some time in the bridge while transiting.

By Saturday we were on station at station 6, east of Greenland. We resumed sample collection in about 2600 meters of water.

The multicore has two cameras on it, one of which is helpful for landing the corer on the seafloor and the other for troubleshooting sampling. One of the cameras we can view images from during the cast via the winch’s sea cable. Mounted near this camera is a light which we have the ability to turn off and on during the cast. The light is kept off for most of the cast, because it draws the most power and we don’t want to drain the batteries. All of the power for the cameras and light come from two batteries mounted to the frame of the corer, which get charged up overnight with a trickle charger. The second camera records the whole cast (which is mostly darkness) because it is a GoPro in a special metal housing. So we start the video recording then pack the GoPronto the housing and mount it on the multicore frame. The housing also has a highly specialized lens that corrects for distortion from the water.

Screenshot of a video from GoPro of a bottom landing

Techs attaching the GoPro camera inside its housing to multicore frame

Multi-core being recovered. Orange boxes on sides are batteries to power camera and light. Small white birds in background are fulmars

This marks the end of 5 weeks aboard the R/V Marcus G. Langseth. It is hard to believe that we have but a few weeks left on our cruise. This week has been quite productive in regards to our primary mission of collecting sediment cores. Most of the days we were able to do 4-6 deployments of the multi core with decent returns on average. I say on average because we have had several deployments with perfect returns and a few with none at all. It certainly is a practice in patience when we spend three or so hours on a deployment to only end up with no mud. The more challenging aspects of deck operations, such as running taglines and operating the winch, have also began to come easier and smoother. I still have much to learn but am worlds better than I was at the beginning of the cruise. Our work hasn’t only been on deck though as we also have been doing work around the shop on small projects as well as organizing all the copious data files from our instrumentation. Excel can at times be just as challenging as operating heavy machinery.

Luckily we have collected all the samples we needed for that station and are now headed towards our last intended station, north of the arctic circle! I am antsy to reach such a northern location especially with these extremely long summer days. By the time I head in for bed the morning light is already beginning to show even at midnight. Looking forward to our transit further north and beginning at our last station.

Week Four 6/30-7/6

The team began the week traveling to station 03 at Orphan Knoll, 320 nautical miles off northern Newfoundland. Upon arrival on Tuesday, they successfully obtained 6 usable cores from the first cast. However, the sediment from the second cast was unsuitable for their project due to its coarse-grained. The team then moved to a new site, station 4, just east of Orphan Knoll. This location had deeper waters, resulting in longer days. On Wednesday and Thursday, they performed four casts per day. By Friday, they had collected enough mud after the third cast and deployed an Argo float. 

This week the weather took a noticeable change. The days were longer, colder and with frequent fog. We’re planning to head further north along the eastern coast of Greenland. I also spent a good chunk of time on our transit, relabeling all shuttles for the multicorer. I did this because many of the shuttles had different numbers from old attempts at labeling. And the inner plastic tube had no label. This made it difficult to track which shuttles were actually collecting usable cores. Additionally, I made a data sheet to record the sampling data that allowed us to see if the location on the multiorder had any impact on sample success. I was a bit nervous about showing the data sheet to the science crew because no one had actually asked me to do any of this but I had asked one of the senior techs if I could do this in my off time but I am happy to say that my efforts seem to be a appreciated! 

6/23-6/29

The days are really blending together now. I feel like I was just in New York a week ago but I also feel like I’ve been working on the boat for a year.  Overall, I’m still having a blast, and everyday I’m excited to be on shift. Deployments have been going well, but we are having difficulties with the samples. At one point we were all really really excited that 5 out of 8 samples were usable. The ocean conditions were not the best but we were also dealing with issues with the shuttles. There’s a lot of discussion on how we can improve them. We’ve been adding wooden blocks to the bottom to help the shuttles not penetrate the bottom too deeply. 

One of the days, the main block (the pulley that the winch wire is run through) on the A-frame was making an awful sound. Turns out the bolts used were too small and some had snapped. It was a really great example of how amazing the engineers on the ship are because they erected scaffolding and had it fixed within the hour. I wish I knew his last name but Sam, the Chief Engineer, has literally fixed every problem that comes up in record time. I am beyond amazed by him and his team. 

I also got to see an ARGO float! Which is something I’ve learned about in college and have used their data for projects. The deployment was pretty straight forward but it was amazing to have that hands-on experience with something i’ve only read about. 

Week Four: 6/30-7/6

With our first three (00, 01, and 02) stations in the rearview, we started week four in transit to station 03 at Orphan Knoll, a feature of the ocean floor about 320nm off the coast of northern Newfoundland.

On Tuesday, we arrived to the site. The first core cast came up with 6 usable cores! Yay! However, by the time the second cast hit the deck, the science team has determined the structure of this sediment was not suitable for their project. It was too coarse-grained, which means it is advective sediment that water flows through rather than getting trapped in. Also, trying to centrifuge the water out of it doesn’t work as well.

We started steaming again and started fresh on Wednesday morning, now calling this site 4, just a little east of station 3/Orphan Knoll. The water is deeper here, which means more wire time and longer days, but hopefully better mud.

Wednesday and Thursday we cranked out four casts per day, pulling 5 or 6 cores off each of them. This sediment contained rocks! Which is exciting, if you like rocks. The rocks are all a sooty black color, until you crack one open to reveal granite or dolomite. This dark outer coating is manganese oxide. Dolomite is a very common bedrock where I live, so I got a nerdy little thrill out of holding pieces of it that we had pulled up through 4000 meters of seawater.

On Friday, we had collected enough mud after cast three of the day, yay! This site was our second of three designated places to deploy an Argo, so we sent that off the stern as we headed out. At first, the Argo laid flat in the water, but within a few seconds, it “came alive”, righted itself, and immediately began a “dive” to 2000m.

In the evening, we spent some time tracing wires and troubleshooting because our echosounder isn’t receiving data properly from the GPS. Then, we played some MarioKart. The following days in transit went similarly; projects and troubleshooting anything acting up, then MarioKart. On Monday we expect to be on station and coring.

We’ve passed our 4 week mark on our cruise aboard the R/V Marcus G. Langseth. We’ve been steadily making our way north and its becoming apparent. The days have become much longer as well as colder. We’ve had a steady stream of fog that comes in most days for several hours at a time. We are almost done with our current station and have been working at a steady pace for the last several days.

Recently I’ve been learning how to operate the winch during deployment and recovery of the mutli-core instrumentation. This is certainly been one of the more challenging technical skills I’ve had to learn while aboard. Both deploying and recovering instrumentation takes quite a bit of coordinated effort between several different people. While I am in the winch booth operating via a remote joystick, there are two people running tag lines, someone operating the A-frame and a deck leader managing everyones actions. It is quite an intricate dance and one where safety is paramount. It can be an anxiety inducing build up but is done within a moment and comes with elation when everything works well.

Tomorrow we will begin setting our sights even further North, riding along the Eastern coast of Greenland. I will be keeping my eyes out for any auroa borealis though seeing the occasional pod of whales has been a good consolation prize if not.