Once I arrived at the R/V Thompson Saturday morning, we began preparing Jason for the cruise. I assisted where necessary but my personal highlight was mounting and troubleshooting the science party’s powered devices. In order to connect the various sensors and actuators to Jason, we drained mineral oil out of the junction box housings then set to work connecting cables. Late into Sunday and Monday morning, we discovered that the MPS and ODI couldn’t communicate. We set to task isolating the fault (wether the issue was subsea or topside) and eventually narrowed down the issue (for both systems) to the adaptor that interfaces the serial connection through the control van (topside) to science’s laptops. Once we realized the issue we were able to build the correct adaptor and fix the issue! It felt great to contribute.
The ship embarked Monday and reached destination Tuesday. Other problems have arisen but as of now we are operating normally. As weird as it sounds, I am thankful I have witnessed issues because it has allowed me to be hands on with Jason. Whether it was building the adaptor, performing pre dive, or sitting in the engineer’s seat for ops, seeing the team troubleshoot issues is a pleasure.
I was nervous going into this experience, primarily because I’ve never spent extended time at sea. Once we started moving I did feel slightly queazy however that feeling has since faded. I was shocked to find the food aboard delicious and the berths are comfy. All in all, this has been throughly enjoyable and I look forward to updating you all as the cruise progresses.
Picture of me wiring Jason’s port side junction box:
Emergency Suit Drill:
The R/V Thompson:
