2130 Local time

Hello!

(My apologies for the lack of images. The Aleutians are stunning, but our internet is not.)

We are two days in on our transit from Seward to Dutch Harbor, where we will mobilize for the next science mission. Our port call in Seward lasted most of this past week and was the longest port call we’ve had so far this season. We lucked out with beautiful weather and enough time to have a proper changeover between off-going and oncoming STARC technicians. Changeover included walking through updates and changes to equipment and lab spaces as well as getting everyone up to speed on ice imagery acquisition for the upcoming mission, which will be way up North in solid ice. Lucky them!

Seward is quite a lovely town and is also home to the University of Alaska, Fairbanks (UAF) Seward Marine Center and research vessel, the R/V Sikuliaq. We met with their facility technician and picked up a variety of packages that were shipped there for STARC. This included, among other things, our two spare CTDs on loan for the remainder of the season. As you will recall, our only spare CTD had been having faulty pressure/depth readings and needed to be swapped out. One of the deliveries was a “purge kit” for the pressure port of the sensor. The kit consisted of mineral oil and a medical-grade syringe and tubing. Purging, for this sensor, rather simply involves inserting the tubing/syringe assembly into a very tiny well, sucking up any existing oil in there, and then filling it with new mineral oil. At the bottom of this small port we ended up sucking up two perfectly formed water droplets. It could be that the water contamination is what caused the initial bubbling when we last inspected the port due to emulsification and could also be responsible for the faulty readings. The true test will be the data quality that comes in on the first cast for the next cruise. Fingers crossed.

An extended stay in port affords a great opportunity to thoroughly inspect and clean the sampling equipment–namely, the two science seawater manifolds on board, which are a network of sensors, valves, piping, and tubing. Armed with a good audiobook, an armful of rags, my favorite set of wrenches and a bouquet of pipe cleaners, getting this equipment tuned and ready for its next mission is a straightforward and rewarding job.

Difficult to believe as we pass the amazing sunlit peaks of the outer Aleutian Islands, but I will soon be leaving Alaska and heading down to Seattle for my last cruise of this six-month internship. I have been to some far-flung places and think it’s pretty cool to come full-circle in a way. The very first cruise back in April was working within the Ocean Observatories Initiative (OOI) Coastal Pioneer Array in the Atlantic and this last cruise will be recovering and deploying moorings within the OOI Coastal Endurance Array off the coast of Washington and Oregon. The observational data provided by these moorings help in understanding how climate change is impacting the ecosystem here. It’s a really cool project and I recommend reading more about it here.

This last cruise will be on the R/V Sally Ride, where I have spent most of my internship. She’s an amazing ship with a great crew and I am looking forward to getting another trip with her.

More soon!

Emily