Category Archives: Cruises

by Lola Pérez-Hernández

WHOI post-doctoral investigator

R.V. Neil Armstrong was sitting at the Icelandic dock. Next to it, a small wooden Viking boat comes in and out giving tourists the experience of sailing in these Nordic waters where puffins and seagulls take turns fishing for white and brown jellyfishes. To their right, the tourists see the German ship Poseidon, and in front sits the Spanish B.O. Sarmiento de Gamboa. If we also count the two Icelandic research vessels docked nearby, it makes five research vessels in the same port. It’s not every day that one finds so many high-tech research vessels together in one place.

I had the chance of visiting the Spanish vessel again with two American friends while it was in port. It is the same ship that in 2011 took me across the Atlantic at 24ºN, and, interestingly, it had the same crew on board along with my old lab-mate and cabin-mate. It seems that we have all decided to move north. My Americans friends pointed out that the Spanish ship has a better coffee machine but its name is harder to pronounce. I must say that on both ships the food is amazing.

Slowly, one after the other, all the foreign ships leave Iceland – first B.O. Sarmiento de Gamboa, then Poseidon, and then us. The weather since we left the dock has been AWSOME, incredibly calm and flat. I admit that I have never been this far north before (I’m from the Canary Islands) and maybe AWSOME is too strong of a word, but the sub-polar Atlantic has a tough reputation. At the moment the ocean is a glassy-smooth mass of water, and I’m expecting to see some whales in this weather. Tomorrow we will finish our transit and begin our work, let’s hope that the weather decides to travel west with us!

by Penny Holliday

Today’s blog is really all about the photos; we’ve had some lovely weather over the past couple of days and so working out on deck has been the place to be. We have also been continually scanning the horizon convinced that with these perfect conditions we surely must see some whales.  This evening we were rewarded with the sight of several family groups of pilot whales nonchalantly cruising by while we did a deep CTD station.

And this afternoon, OSNAP postdoc Feili had a float named after him, which we hope will travel around the subpolar North Atlantic collecting temperature and salinity profiles every 10 days.  The data from these Argo floats (‘Feili’ and many other similar ones in the region) will be making a huge contribution to the OSNAP goals by helping to give information about conditions between our mooring sites.

Pilot whales

Perfect weather for whale watching

Feili and a float called Feili

Good weather for mooring work

Evening sky

Photos by Penny Holliday

by Penny Holliday

We’re coming to the end of the third full day of science work, and in that very short time the science team of DY054 has settled into a kind of a routine that goes like this: day work is recovering and re-deploying our moorings, and nights are spent doing CTDs and releasing floats.

I cant speak for everyone of course, but it does feel to me as though we’ve found our routine pretty quickly. The scientists that I’ve been training up have been extremely quick to learn what they need to do, and seem to be enjoying themselves so far! The excellent food that is produced by the galley team is a large part of that enjoyment and there is much discussion about how on earth to manage not to put on weight during the cruise. There seem to be three main camps: try to eat in moderation; exercise like a demon to work off those 3 cooked meals a day (plus pudding); or just accept it and plan to lose the weight later. I’m in the first group – let’s see how well that goes!

Another key factor working at sea is of course the weather – and so far it has been kind to us, and I am keeping my fingers crossed that it stays that way.

Final stage of mooring deployment

Deploying a RAFOS float

Attaching a currentmeter to a mooring

Mia, Anna, and Amanda

Roald, Feili, and Zoltan on starboard deck

OSNAP, Year 3 Leg 1, 56 42.45N 33 42.02W, 19-July-2016, At the Bight, and Oceanographer  Heartbreak.

by Heather Furey

So, we made it!  We are at the Bight.  I have to say though, troops are restless.  There are rumors flying around the ship about when we’ll get back.  I have heard, ‘Not til Saturday 0600’, ‘Definitely Friday 2200, before the bars close’, and ‘Friday morning 0900’, as time estimates.  All ETAs reported just today, and all from reputable sources!  We are in the UNOLS ship schedule to hit the dock Saturday July 23^rd, so anything earlier is, well, earlier.  Really, it just depends how fast we can get this set of nine CTD stations done.  There is a lot of motivation to get back Friday night.  We are in the middle of the third CTD cast as I write.

I saw the first sun I have seen in a long time this morning as we travelled south, though it is cold outside today. The ocean looks pretty much the same here as anywhere else, but underneath us is a totally different story.  We are over the south channel of the Bight now, a deep channel running east to west through the Reykjanes Ridge.  Here and the north channel of this fracture zone are the only deep passages from east to west through this mountain range for hundreds of kilometers to the south, and the very first passage through since the deep overflow current first formed and started flowing southward at the head of the Iceland Basin.

From the perspective of being at the south channel’s deepest point, the mountains rise 1200 meters to the south and at least 1400 meters to the north.  We have not passed over the highest point yet, so I have no multi-beam bathymetry data to know how shallow the northern mountain stands.  If I were out hiking, I would expect some strong mountain pass winds through such a gap due to orographic steering.  We think we might expect this here too in an oceanographic sense, water flowing strongly from east to west, funneled through this narrow gap.  A velocity profile will be available soon, once ‘the package’ is on deck.  (‘The package’ is the suite of water sample bottles, LADCP, which measures velocity, and CTD, which measures pressure, temperature and salinity.)

There are a couple of moorings out here now, one in each channel, that get pulled out summer of 2017, next year. Can’t wait to see what those data show, but they are so much more valuable for the velocity, temperature, and salinity data were collecting right now.  We are taking a reference section, from which we can get transport, and to which we may compare the two years of mooring velocity, temperature and salinity data later.

Back in the lab, though, folks are packing up.  Clean work tables?  Packed bags four days before we hit port?  Definitely, folks are ready to go home. And getting creative with how they spend their spare time (see map of Scotland). Food is still very good; I am impressed.  Swordfish with fresh chili pepper and red onion salsa, julienned carrots, with cabbage, and also squash?  I love vegetables, and the fact that there still exist freshly prepared vegetables weeks after leaving port is like gold to me.  Thank you, Mark and Wally.

Update:  Oceanographic Heartbreaker. The cooling on the hydraulic part of the deep tow winch failed at 0330 this morning (20 July), and we were not able to complete the section across the Bight.  It would have taken about six hours to fix, and we did not have enough time left.  We have some very valuable data in the form of a complete section across the southern channel, but it is a real disappointment!  Stuart, our Chief Scientist, states that in his experience things tend to fail at the end of a long trip, especially when trying to do a bit extra work.  Well, this is a case in point.   So we are headed back to the dock, ETA now about 1400 on Friday.  Cruise complete.

OSNAP Year 3 Leg 1, 17-July-2016, 58d 45.19N 30d 16.38W, Back on The Line.

by Heather Furey

We are nearing the end of this cruise. We have four more CTD stations to take on the OSNAP line, one ‘cal-dip’ (where instruments are attached to the CTD frame and calibrated in deep water), one mooring to deploy, having recovered its companion mooring in pea-soup fog this afternoon, and one final mooring to turn-around (both recover and deploy).  My head is on land today, laying out plans for hiking in Iceland when I get there, and for getting home to see my peeps.  I think it is because we went so close to Reykjavik when Greg got picked up by helicopter.

But, we are still at sea.

Here on board, a few things:  First, Wally’s Surprise was served at dinner tonight.  I can’t tell you what it was, because that would spoil the surprise for the next Leg’s science crew, but it was pretty darned good.  Excellent, in fact.  Second, some mystery person has been putting up Pokémon monsters hidden in plain sight around the ship.  Pokémon Go, here.  I do not have much to say about that, just that it is happening.

Now that we are nearing the end of the scheduled science, we get a little time to play!  Most cruises have a few ‘weather days’ built in to the schedule, for things like gales, or getting personnel helicoptered off the ship, or equipment repair … whatever comes up.  See how the ship is sort of near the Bight Fracture Zone?  We seem to still have a breath of time left, and will use it to go back to the Bight!

Part of measuring the overturning circulation (O-SNAP=Overturning Circulation of the Subpolar North Atlantic Program) is measuring the bottom currents.  The Iceland-Scotland Overflow Water makes up the bottom current that flow southward from the shallow sill between Iceland and Scotland.  The dense overflow water sinks to the deep Iceland Basin and forms a boundary current travelling from north to south along the west side of the Iceland Basin, which is also the east flank of the Reykjanes Ridge.  But, this “flavor” water is also found in the western Atlantic Basin and it is still not quite known exactly how this water gets from one basin to the other.

This is where the fracture zones come in.  Fracture zones are deep breaks in the ridge, like missing vertebrae in the spine of the North Atlantic.   Historically, if you open a research paper that is puzzling out this mystery, you would see a figure showing the deep ISOW water arrow following the eastern flank of the Reykjanes Ridge, turning into the western Atlantic through the Charlie Gibbs Fracture Zone further south.  This is the deepest and widest fracture zone in the Reykjanes-Mid-Atlantic Ridge system.    But these days, we think that some of (all of?) the shallower portion of the deep ISOW current flows through upstream cracks in the Reykjanes Ridge into the western Atlantic.  Makes sense to me.  How much?  Modelers have estimates, but no one has measured it.

The Bight is a shallower fracture zone upstream in an Iceland-Scotland-Overflow-Water sense.  We went there first in 2014, on the first OSNAP cruise, knowing that that no-one had ever taken CTD stations in this fracture zone.  Second time in all of history the Bight will be surveyed? Sign me up, let’s go!

P.S. Greg is on a plane home to Miami as I write, back to family and good care.  Safe and sound.

by Heather Furey

We woke up this morning to the awful news of a van driving into a crowd celebrating Bastille Day in Nice.  Our French nationals onboard did not personally know anyone hurt.  So sad and so useless, the killing.

You might notice by the latitude and longitude above that we are no longer on the OSNAP line.  Two reasons: Firstly, at about 15:00 yesterday, we started to steam north to avoid the worst of an incoming gale.  We would have been down for weather anyway, so it was wise to outrun the worst of it.  Secondly, we are steaming to Reykjavik to rendezvous with an Icelandic Coast Guard helicopter.

This came about because a member of the science party injured his back a few days ago:  an old back injury that was seriously aggravated during an odd twist during the deck work of mooring recovery.  Early this morning, since there have been no signs of improvement, the captain decided that Greg needed better and more immediate medical attention. The captain consulted with the UK Coast Guard to see what the best course of action should be.  The UK Coast Guard contacted the Icelandic Coast Guard, and we are now en route to rendezvous 150 nautical miles from Reykjavik, the outer range for the rescue helicopter, where Greg will be ‘helivac’ed back to Reykjavik, a doctor, medical treatment, and home.    We are sad he is leaving us, but glad that he will be in less pain soon.  Eight more days under rolling seas with limited sleep would have been very unkind.

One thing about being at sea, everyone has a story.

Yesterday, I deployed the last of the RAFOS floats.  The captain had come to me earlier in the day with the idea that while we did not have time to complete CTD stations while outrunning the storm, we did have time to complete the RAFOS buy nexium online deployments. The deployments are quick: before coming onto station, the float, which has been previously tested and armed for mission, is loaded into a launching tube.  A starch ring, which will dissolve in water, is inserted into a piston release mechanism.  The bottom trap door on the launch tube is wired to the piston.  As we come onto station, the ship slows to about two knots speed.  The loaded launch tube is lowered into the water, the starch ring dissolves, the trap door at the bottom of the launch tube opens, and the glass float slips into the sea as we slowly steam away.  Although it takes some time to set up for deployment, the actual deployment takes just a few minutes.

It is my great pleasure to be allowed into ‘The Red Zone’, at the aft guard rails, to help with and oversee the deployment.  The ship’s crew helps me, and I am grateful for their necessary and able assistance.   While deploying the last of the RAFOS floats at the back rail, I had time to talk with the A/B, Will, who was helping me.  He came to this job after spending years in the UK Army as an explosive specialist.  He told me tales of crawling through the wire and pipe tunnels under the city streets in Northern Ireland finding and disarming bombs planted by the IRA.  And of being in Afghanistan searching for land mines by poking a metal pole into the sand, describing the sound of the metal on metal clunk when he would find a mine.  He would then dig the live mine out of the sand, and disable it to ensure his own troops’ safe passage.  An explosives specialist, standing next to me, helping me launch armed-for-mission RAFOS floats into the abyss.  You just never know.

OSNAP, Year 3 Leg 1, 57 55.86N 25 6.19W, 09-July-2016, Weather day.

By Heather Furey

Yesterday, the sea was molten silver.  No organized swell, just a satin finish top, with the water moving underneath as though thickly boiling, heaving.  I like to go to sea for the work of it, and because I have a great job.  But the human details are what I enjoy most while out here.

Because this is an international program, each year, and sometimes each leg, the research program utilizes ships from different countries. People from everywhere staff the ships and ride as science crew. The most important thing for me is to try to pick apart dialects and accents.  We need to understand each other to successfully get our work done.  I find particular delight in the French accent, perhaps because I studied French in school for four years.  On board this year, I am trying to understand thick Scottish-, British-, and Chinese-accented English.  And French.  I miss our Dutch colleagues.  The Dutch nationals will all be on the next leg, boarding in Reykjavik for Leg 2 OSNAP, to ride the RRS Discovery’s return trip from Reykjavik to Southampton.

I notice, too, the way different groups hold cutlery.  Americans do not generally hold their knives while eating.  They move the knife to the fork hand to cut, then cut, then put the knife back down, move the fork back to the hand that just held the knife, and pick up the bite with their fork.  Scottish and British tend to hold on to both pieces of silverware all the time.  They push food onto their forks using their knives, and then lift the fork up to eat.  No transfer of knife to the other hand if cutting is required.  English in particular tends to eat with their fork upside-down, along with the knife in the opposite hand.

Condiments on each ship are a playground.  ‘Heinz Salad Cream’?  ‘HP Sauce’?  ‘Golden Shredless’? ‘Robinson’s Barley Water’? ‘HP Fruity’? What are these?  ‘Bovril: The Original Beef Extract’? Am I supposed to put that on toast? It is stored in with the peanut butter, jams, and butter pats.  Why would I put beef extract on my toast?

Back to science and hot off the press, the very first batch of RAFOS floats, deployed in June 2014 off the R/V Knorr, has surfaced!  With this type of instrument, it is all about where the water goes, and not about how the water changes while moving past a stationary point (e.g., mooring).

Usually the sample size is small, but, always, something new is learned.  So where did the floats that seeded the Iceland-Scotland Overflow Water in the deep Charlie-Gibbs Fracture Zone go over the past two years?  I have not had time to work up the trajectory data, but can show you the two-year displacement vector diagram I worked up this morning.  Deployment site is at the blue dot in the Charlie-Gibbs; black lines show the 2-year displacement; bullets denote sound source locations, bathymetry drawn at 1000, 2000, and 3000 meters.  The floats launched in the deepest currents off the East Reykjanes Ridge and off East Greenland in summer 2014 will surface late July and Mid-August, respectively.  The RAFOS results are starting to come in.  Stay tuned.

By Tiago Bilo

After the 15^th day at sea, scientists from University of Miami lead by Dr. William Johns had successfully deployed their fifth deep water mooring under the curious watch of Pilot Whales. This mooring is part of the set of nine moorings placed on the North Atlantic subpolar gyre, close to the fractures and rough topography of the Reykjanes Ridge (off the southern coast of Iceland).

As the RRS Discovery moves forward in completing its mission, we gather more and more important data that can you buy levitra at walmart will help us to put the pieces of the circulation puzzle together. The size of the piece will depend on the puzzle of interest. Each equipment recover and deployment may represent a large piece to understand the circulation within a channel or fracture, or a tiny little piece of the Earth’s climate system.

Deployment of one of the Heather’s (Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution, US) glider being watched by crew members and Scientists). Using yellow hard hats are SAMS scientists Loic (on the left) and Stuart (on the right).

Pilot Whales carefully watching the RRS Discovery and the research activities

University of Miami group (Greg, Tiago, Mark, Cobi) and John (RRS Discovery CPOS) deploying one of the moorings.

by Loic Houpert

It’s been now more than a week that we left Glasgow on the RRS Discovery for the OSNAP cruise DY053. We entered the Iceland Basin yesterday to start the maintenance of the US moorings, after successfully turnover the SAMS moorings in Rockall Trough and recover Bowmore (the SAMS glider) on Rockall Plateau.

The RRS Discovery left Glasgow on Wednesday 29th June. The SAMS team (Estelle, John, Karen, Kamila, Stuart and myself) had the shortest trip to join the ship. Yunli, a technician from Ocean University of China, came from Qingdao (in China)! We also have a lot of people coming from the US. Bill Johns and his team (Adam, Cobi, Mark, Greg, Tiago and Dom) came from Miami, and Heather came from Woods Hole (in the Massachusetts). Dave, Chris, Steve, Andy, Jeff and Zoltan are all based at NOC (Southampton) and complete the science party of this scientific cruise.

The purpose of this OSNAP cruise is to service the Scottish and US moorings, deploy RAFOS floats, and deploy and recover gliders. All these observation are essential for us to better understand the ocean circulation and its role on the European and global climate. Moreover there is mounting evidence of the importance of the ocean circulation in the subpolar North Atlantic for the region’s marine ecosystem, the formation of hurricanes, and rainfall in the Sahel, and parts of the USA.

Part of the SAMS team (from left to right: myself, Stuart, Estelle, John) during recovery of one of the SAMS mooring, with Zlotan (a.k.a IT guru) and Mark (blue helmet)

Happy selfie after the recovery of Bowmore, with our two glider experts (Estelle and Karen)

The RRS Discovery entering the Rockall Trough, with the Seaglider Bowmore (in pink) and a dophin-whale (thanks Dom for the crafting)

http://cymbaltasupports.com first US mooring, lead by Bill (in the middle). Dom (on the right side) observed with attention the work on the back deck.” width=”692″ height=”519″ /> ea time for the Principal Scientific Officer of the cruise (Stuart, on the left) during the recovery of the first US mooring, lead by Bill (in the middle). Dom (on the right side) observed with attention the work on the back deck.

By Dasha Atamanchuk

This doesn’t sound new: Having bad data is worse than having no data!  Anyone who had to deal with ‘fishy’ numbers coming out from instrument will agree.

A strong motivation is driving Dalhousie team of scientists to work around the clock on collecting and processing water samples in order to produce QC data for e.g. oxygen sensors on CTD rosette, SeaCycler, a surface-profiling mooring,  and other moorings.  Only the sensor float of SeaCycler itself is populated with 13 (!) different sensors, which require in situ calibration.  While some water samples can be processed straightaway in the chemistry lab onboard, the rest will be sent home and analyzed at Dalhousie University in Halifax, NS, Canada.

So what’s happening in the lab?

GEOMAR and Dalhousie provided two titration systems for the analysis of oxygen samples onboard.  Chemistry behind the method was described by Winkler back in 1888 and with certain modifications it remains a gold standard for oxygen measurements for more than a century now.  However two systems utilize their own detection method (voltammetry vs. colorimetry), sample volume and concentration of reagents. Despite all the differences, an agreement in oxygen values between two systems is impeccable. The results are truly encouraging for both GEOMAR and Dalhousie teams who rely on their systems in the assessment of instruments’ performance.

Chlorophyll and CDOM (Coloured Dissolved Organic Matter) samples are partly processed onboard and preserved for later analysis.  The same concerns nutrients and the carbonate system probes.

Once the chemists have done their job, it’s up to the deployed instruments to show what is hidden in the blue and cold waters of the Labrador Sea. See CERC.OCEAN website for more information about the SeaCycler mooring.

Fig.1: Work routine: Dasha and Kat are running two independent Winkler oxygen systems in parallel.

Fig.2: A filtering station for Chlorophyll, CDOM and nutrients gets ready for the next batch of samples.