Our voyage became a little rough today as
we passed through the Drake
Passage. The Drake Passage is notorious for having rough seas and we could
certainly feel the sway of the boat as we tried to walk down hallways and through
doorways. It could have been a lot worse, so we are counting our blessings, but
a few folks on board did find themselves curled up in bed for the better part
of the day (myself included). For those who are well enough to eat, the food
has been fantastic! Today for dinner we had salmon with Chilean king-crab legs.
It was a very fitting meal considering that we all have king crabs on the brain!
Speaking of our science work, last night
we pulled up some images of sea-ice cover on the Antarctic Peninsula. It looks
like about 90% of our initial study sight is still covered in ice! Moving surface
ice could have negative effects on both aspects of our project. The ice could bury
our crab pots, making them impossible to recover and the ice could also damage
the cable that connects SeaSled to the Palmer.
Rather than take the risk, we’ve decided to move our study site further north
where the ice cover is reduced. This means it will take a little less time to
reach our site but we will have to do several imaging transects in order to get
a good idea of where the crabs are. We are learning that a big part of being scientists
is being willing to be flexible!
-Steph, Katie, and Dan
 |
| Sea ice cover. The red is 90 to 100% cover |
No comments:
Post a Comment