Mission Logs

The production crew arrived in Monterey yesterday. Most of the equipment arrived before we did and was waiting for us at the office of the Monterey Bay National Marine Sanctuary. Unfortunately a few pieces have not arrived, and we've bene anxiously working with the shipping company to see if they will be delivered today. By the end of the day, all of the video gear was here, but we are still waiting for the box that contains the power supply for the remotely-operated vehicle. 

During the first show of the day on Monday, March 3rd, I was sitting in the satellite truck watching the show when all of a sudden the lights went out.  And so did everything else.  The monitors went out, the equipment went dark, and it got really quiet.  The power was out and we were off the air!  I thought about calling the director to tell him what happened but the communications box was dead as well. 

Today's dives were conducted in a rocky reef just offshore from Monterey. We dove in about 120 feet of water and what was really striking to me was the contrast between this habitat and the kelp forest habitat that we’ve been looking at for the past few days. At this dive site there was not much algae, as we’re below the depth at which most of these marine plants are able to photosynthesize. We also encountered huge schools of rockfish, colorful nudibranchs, large white Metridium anemones, and even gorgonian corals. It’s amazing how diverse this community truly is. And how different it is from the other habitats in the Monterey Bay National Marine Sanctuary. 

Live camera work is always a challenge. Add to that the cold underwater environment, communications, lighting and a host of divers, and things can get down right tricky. Any small issues that rear their ugly heads underwater are amplified ten-fold by the nature of the near-weightless environment... and another ten-fold by the unforgiving deadline of live TV. 

We have begun our third day of surveying along our first Grand Banks transect, working our way to the northeast toward Cape Race, Newfoundland. So far we have collected about 60 nautical miles of continuous side-sonar and subbottom profiler data using our towed system, Echo. 

Browse the sites of our upcoming expeditions with this interactive map. 

We are currently surveying along the coast between Mistaken Point and Drook Point, a little west of Race Point. The geology of this area is quite spectacular. 

The area along the southeastern part of the Avalon Peninsula in the vicinity of Cape Race is notorious for shipwrecks for several reasons.  Over the past three centuries the waters along this coastline has been heavily trafficked by ships traveling between Europe and North America, as well as fishing boats plying the fertile waters of the Grand Banks. 

How do you find shipwrecks and underwater sites?  What tools do archaeologists use to find and then document these mysteries beneath the waves?  Join scientists live from Thunder Bay National Marine Sanctuary as they explore site in the waters of Lake Huron September 12, 2008.  Three live broadcasts highlight three field projects from the 2008 field season.  Half-hour broadcasts take place at 10:00 am, 1:00 pm, and 3:00 pm EST.  Viewers can submit questions for expedition scientists to answer during the programs. 

Many divers who visit the shipwrecks in the Thunder Bay National Marine Sanctuary use air in their SCUBA tanks. Air consists mostly of oxygen and nitrogen--you are breathing these gases right now. But did you know that oxygen and nitrogen affect a diver differently under water than above water? This is due to the pressure exerted on the diver by all the water around him or her. The deeper divers go, the more pressure they experience. Using air in your SCUBA tanks work great when diving wrecks up to about 40 m (130 ft) deep. Beyond that depth, divers use a mix of different gases to eliminate some of the safety hazards that oxygen and nitrogen can present during deep dives.

The Iver2 autonomous underwater vehicle (AUV) is a commercial AUV system manufactured by Ocean-Server Technology of Fall River, MA. The University of Michigan owns and operates two custom Iver2 AUV systems. These systems serve as a multi-vehicle testbed for conducting underwater robotic navigation research. The vehicles have been customized to include advanced navigation and mapping sensors typically found on full-ocean depth AUVs. For example, the AUVs have down-looking camera systems for taking pictures of the sea floor. They also have acoustic sonar sensors for mapping large areas of the bottom. The two vehicles can work together by talking to each other with underwater acoustic modems.