The past few days haven’t been the most eventful since we finished processing sediment. We have been waiting for the washed sediment to dry in filter paper which took forever since we don’t have an oven to speed up the process. Since most of the samples are sandy, there is a lot of coarse fraction to pack up. I was able to portion out sediment for my own research purposes and now I have a large Ziploc bag (very) full of approximately 80 samples of sediment. 

Big news on the boat: they have put out canned Diet Coke for us now. Usually the cooks stash good snacks/drinks and slowly put them out over time and canned beverages ended up being a hit. As small as it is, it was such a treat to keep the momentum up on the final days of our trip. 

When I woke back up around 3pm, it was cheese o’clock, so a great start to my day. I was delighted to see that my PI and lab mate made great progress on washing, but picking was still going slow. However, since we only needed to pick from the first 6cm, we were able to finish EVERYTHING today! This gave me a great sense of accomplishment and relief since we were worried we wouldn’t be able to process everything before we got back to port. 

It was someone’s birthday today so we got cake! The pros of having a research cruise in September is that there are a lot of birthdays in September so we had a lot of celebratory desserts. It was also “Italian” night so we had spaghetti and meatballs with homemade focaccia. After dinner, I made time to sit out on the bow and watch the sunset which consisted of so many types of clouds. 

Today I made a lot of progress on washing and finished picking all of the intervals that I needed to in search of live foraminifera! I also got to watch my friend come out of Alvin in the afternoon which was fun. An Alvin tradition for first-time divers is to be dunked with water so I was encouraged  to fill up a couple of buckets before she got out. 

In the evening, we were given a couple of push cores from the Alvin deployment to sample. We decided to preserve all of the Miliolida we found, just in case they were alive. Since my lab mate had dove in Alvin today, I took charge of processing the push cores on the night shift. Picking took a lot longer than expected and before I knew it, it was 7am. As exhausting as the shift was, I was able to slice both cores, collect water, and preserve about 50 foraminifera (which were hard to find).

A vibrant polychaete I found while washing sediment.

For some reason I woke up at 6:30am today, wide awake. Maybe it was all the noises from the rocking ship. I felt much better than I did the night before. So I decided to get breakfast, which I am never awake for. Today they had a ‘build your own bagel’ bar, which was nice. I decided to take advantage of the energy I had and get to work. Once again, I was washing mud and picking the first few samples in search of life. We found more Miliolida in the core, which are again the order of foraminifera we are most interested in. We also got a surprise core from a different groups’ MC deployment which they did not want. It was a short core, but nice to have because it had the same depth of the core with the species that we were looking for. In addition to forams, I found other weird things in the mud…

Today was again spent looking at the first few centimeters of the sediment cores for life, followed by lots of washing. Besides foraminifera, we have been finding lots of other interesting things in the mud. We have found many worms (especially nematodes) of various sizes, polychaetes, and even a slug. Some have been found dead, but many alive which is so fascinating to watch and admittedly has slowed me down in the picking process because I can’t look away.

Another interesting event today was the Alvin recovery which brought back two squid with it. Unfortunately they cannot live very long out of the water so they were used for science and bait for the fisherman on board.

Tonight we had the first batch of bad weather for the entire journey. We hit some rough seas and it made it very hard for me to concentrate as I got a little sea sick. Around 1am I decided to call it and go to bed “early”.

A live (we are pretty sure) foraminifera, Bulimina spp.

SUNSET BREAK!

Today we had to start processing all the mud we collected over the past two days. We first focus on the top 6cm of each core to see if we can find any live foraminifera. We found a couple, but not nearly as many as we would have liked. It is really challenging to tell if the benthic foraminifera are living without using dye to test for live tissues. Unfortunately, we couldn’t stain the samples because that could interfere with the microbiology they were planning on performing on these specimens. Sometimes little inside bits will stick out of the shells and be more orange in color. Sometimes you can see the tissue through the shells. 

We were also examining the samples for benthic foraminifera of the class Milliolida. These tests are known to be good tracers of methane seepage, which is what we are interested in! We are coring along the U.S. Atlantic Margin (USAM) looking at somewhat recently discovered methane seepage sites. This is important because methane is a very potent greenhouse gas and plays an important role in our climate. Since these foraminifera live subannual lives, they can create a high resolution record when measuring the carbon isotopes of individual shells to trace methane seepage events through time. 

Only one core (the most shallow and challenging to core) had the Milliolida, but we were so excited to see them when we did! This gives us hope that the species we are interested in are in the sites we are also interested in and can help guide us on where to core next. 

Most importantly, we took a much needed sunset break in between processing samples. It never fails to amaze me. Later that night, a few of us went to the bow of the ship to do some stargazing. Since it was a new moon and we were far enough from land to have no light pollution, it was an incredible sight.

Another long day and night coring. We started at 6pm and finished around 5am. We put down five deployments, but only collected about 10cm of sediment from one core. The MC struggled to get good samples due to the seafloor being tough and full of beds of mussels. Some of our sites were pretty shallow, so the turnaround time was pretty fast, which was also exhausting. The last deployment was just a visual survey with the cameras attached to the MC so we didn’t actually core. The visual survey was of new grounds that hadn’t yet been explored, so that was exciting. We saw a lot of sea creatures including, anemones, various fish, squid, skates, and an octopus.

Today was a long day (and night). We finally got to core! We had to start coring as soon as Alvin got on deck and was put away. We went to the sites we had picked out a couple days before. There was a strong current today, making it tough to get the multicore to land properly. The first deployment was a bust, we couldn’t get the instrument to trigger, allowing the feet of the tubes to close. We realized that since the current was so strong, we needed to give the instrument more cord and hope that it wouldn’t wrap around the MC. We also figured out that we needed to adjust the speed at which we were pushing the corer into the sediment and the speed at which it was brought back up. After this, we had four good deployments, getting mud each time. This led to us slicing a lot of mud. We had so much sample that we had to throw some of it back into the ocean. We got pretty efficient by the end of the night when it came to tag lining, collecting water samples, and bagging sediment. Me and another grad student continued to process the cores while the two PIs worked on deploying the MC for another group of cores. We repeated this process over and over again with very little breaks. Some of the cores were challenging to process as they would get stuck on the stand that you place the core on to slice it. At one point, three of us were working together to push the core down. By 5:30am we were done, and I was very sore and tired.

Mini styrofoam cup that has been to the bottom of the ocean!!

Today had a frustrating start because our coring date was pushed back again. This meant we needed to continue washing all the samples from the previous cores in the meantime. Luckily, we were able to wash the rest of our samples by the end of the day, giving me time in the evening to work in the library and watch a movie with friends in the TV room. 

Some of us drew silly pictures (mainly nautical themed) on styrofoam cups that were then placed in Alvin. They shrink when they are brought to depth, so we each get a tiny cup that has been to the bottom of the ocean! I made mine Spongebob themed…

I haven’t done a whole lot in the past couple of days. There have been some kinks in the cruise plan, so we have been on the same site for a while. The Lander (which holds some science equipment at the bottom of the ocean) got stuck and wouldn’t come up when it should have. This meant we had to send Alvin down to bring it up manually, which was time consuming. Since the Lander was down for so long, the samples were ruined and needed to be tried again. 

While I am waiting for the next core site, we are continuing to wash mud from the two cores we do have. It has been complicated though because we learned we can’t dump dirty water overboard if we are on the CTD site as we have been doing in case it ruins samples. So we have to find pockets of time in transit to dump. Luckily, we got a huge trash can that we can wash samples over for now so our buckets don’t fill as fast. Unfortunately, the methane seep samples are stinky and attract a lot of flies…

Since we aren’t finding many foraminifera in our seep site, we decided we should move locations for the next core. Sitting down with the rest of the team to decide where to core was really interesting. We needed to find a transect that was in just the right spot. Somewhere close to a methane seep, where we could then core progressively away from the seep and also get a background site nearby. On top of that, we need to make sure that the sites are in areas where we will likely get foraminifera, not too deep, too shallow, too cold, etc. Hopefully we found just the right spot to try coring tomorrow night if everything goes to plan.

Once the sun set and we were able to dump some muddy water, the fly situation got better (but not great). We were able to wash more samples on deck listening to music. While we were washing, someone showed us the squid that unfortunately got stuck in Alvin, before tossing it overboard.

Washing sediment and waiting for it to dry.

Today I woke up early to get back onto the day shift schedule so I could wash sediment without waiting for the CTD, which can only be deployed at night since Alvin takes up daytime hours. We washed the first few samples of a different core than yesterday that was much easier to wash. We were also able to find some of the foraminifera species we had been searching for. We scanned each centimeter for live foraminifera, but only found a few viable specimens. This process took us most of the day. In the evening I got to relax a little and watched Hamilton the movie with friends. 

We also took a break in the middle of the day to watch Alvin come back up to the ship. The process is very involved. They send out a small life boat with swimmers to guide Alvin back to the Atlantis. It is then carried up by crane and placed on tracks that lead into a garage on the ship. There is a ladder near the edge of the tracks where the people in Alvin can climb down to get out. They usually get their pictures taken and we all cheered for the folks who went, emphasizing those who had their first dive. Before Alvin is put to rest in the garage, it needs to be cleaned off so the saltwater doesn’t linger and do damage.

Alvin coming back on deck after a dive.

Today we had to spend time processing the cores collected the past couple of days. This involves washing the sliced cores and examining the samples for foraminifera, single-celled calcifying creatures that live in the ocean and deposit their shells in the sediment when they die. We ran into some trouble when washing the sediment, which needed to be washed into buckets to remove fine fraction. This was difficult for a couple of reasons. For one, we couldn’t wash the sediment into the sink because it could damage the drain so we needed to wash into buckets that we dumped overboard later. However, you cannot dump material overboard when the CTD is being deployed. Tonight, the CTD was deployed for several hours making it nearly impossible to find pockets of time in between deployments to dump. The first out of three deployments lasted four hours. Secondly, the mud we washed was very sticky and challenging to wash, meaning we had to use a lot of water, filling the buckets faster than usual. We also, unfortunately, didn’t find many of the species we were looking for.

Today I woke up at 1pm fully ruining any resemblance of a sleep schedule. Alvin returned early which meant we could deploy the MC early as well. So we did. Around 4pm we were able to deploy the MC. Before then me and another grad student watched it get set up so we could learn. Unfortunately, that ended early because yet again, we were running out of time. Hopefully we will learn how to tie the knots to be able to help deploy soon. This time around, we had a successful launch and collected 2 good cores. While the machine was coming up, we rushed to eat dinner in 20 minutes. In the middle of the night, we got to learn how to deploy and bring up the MC instrument. It was a bit overwhelming with a lot of steps to learn, including how to successfully tie a bowline knot. Afterwards, I felt like a true sailor. While waiting for the MC to come up so we could hook it with giant sticks and guide it on deck, we got to see a school of squid right next to the boat swimming around.

Next, came the messy part: processing the cores. We collected seawater from one core that we put in the fridge for analyses later. Then we put one core in the fridge (vertically so the mud wouldn’t slide around) and we sliced the second core by the centimeter. We repeated slicing for the core that was in the fridge. Luckily, we got to watch a beautiful sunset as we were working with the mud, making the experience more magical. I consider the beautiful scenery and successful sample collection the perfect way to spend my birthday.

One core from the multiple corer that we then processed.

The multiple corer back on deck for sampling, this time somewhat successfully, with at least one good core.

This morning I woke up a bit early so I could have breakfast before having to do fire and man overboard drills. At 8 am we all grabbed life vests and immersion suits before going to our designated stations. Lucky for me, anyone who hadn’t tried on an immersion suit before had to do so today to make sure they fit. These giant rubber suits were intense. You have to lay them out like a sleeping bag to put it on and the gloves look like lobster claws. To zip it up completely, it zips over your face and then you velcro over your eyes/forehead. 

Afterwards, I completed my Alvin training which included going inside the submarine! It was very exciting. You have to climb on top of the vessel to climb down a small ladder and scoot to your assigned seat. It is very small and only fits three people, but it has a lot of scientific equipment packed into it. It sort of looks like a cockpit of a plane as there are hundreds of buttons that each have their own importance. 

We officially set said at 10am EDT! Lots of people were out on the deck taking in the views as we left port, passing by massive military ships. Dolphins escorted us out of Chesapeake Bay towards open waters.

Later on, I worked on filtering water with my colleague. Unfortunately, there were a lot of kinks in our plans. First, our original filtration device had hydrophobic filters (given to us by accident) so they would not work for filtering seawater. Then it turned out that we were using the wrong mesh sized filter once we found another way, so we had to refilter our partially filtered water which was a bit frustrating and very time consuming. Since we needed to use the smaller filter, the water pressure kept growing as it was trying to get through the mesh and occasionally ‘exploded’ by the plumbing popping off the filters.

It was our first night shift since we set sail and we had the chance to deploy tonight! It was a very long day and night. By the time we reached our destination to where we wanted our samples from, it was about 1am. We then had several issues with trying to deploy the multiple corer machine we were using to collect samples. The bungee that helps stabilize the machine from the top of it to the rope that the crane uses to move the multiple corer (MC) up and down kept breaking. We were fighting time as we needed to deploy by 4am in order to be out of the way for the Alvin rover to deploy first thing in the morning. We were able to finally fix the bungee issue, with 20 minutes to spare. However, when we deployed, the hooks that trigger the tubes to close must have been hooked on incorrectly because we kept losing our samples. At about 5:30am, we gave up and decided to try the next day.

Our oh so fancy water filtering station designed to pump seawater (on left) through multiple filters and into the container on the ground (it took forever). The beaker is simply there to catch leaking water from outside the filters.

A beautiful sunset as we approached our coring destination.

Today was a pretty easy day. I got to sleep in which felt wonderful given the jet lag. I went over scientific protocols with my supervisor to get a better understanding of what we were actually doing. A bit overwhelming, but very helpful. We will be some of the first people to get data from this cruise so we have to make sure we are ready to go (exciting!). I’ve never been on a cruise before or have worked with these types of samples, so I am nervous about messing up the procedure, but excited to try something new. 

We had an orientation after lunch to go over safety procedures on the ship given a variety of scenarios. One of which was geared towards mainly students, who were housed in the “forward berthing”. This meant that we only had one stairwell in and out. In case of an emergency, we were shown where the ladder was to climb out and all had to do it. It is a little tight at the top so it took me a second to get my knees oriented. 

Afterwards I did some work in the library. The comfy chairs and freshly stalked snacks made this a more pleasant experience. My team and I decided to have one last meal on land before we set sail. We had sushi downtown and ended the night with an ice cream back on ship. 

Hydrolab set up for picking foraminifera:

I got in late to Norfolk last night so I was super tired this morning, but excited to get settled on the RV Atlantis. I left my very comfortable hotel room and met my team downstairs. Me and another grad student had to Uber because the rental car had too much equipment in it to hold two more people. When we got to the military base, we had to wait in line outside to go into this very small room and receive our visitor badges. The sun and the high humidity along with the weight of our bags made this a tad uncomfortable. With our new badges, we were able to scan to get onto base and  walk through to where the ship was docked. It was a bit chaotic. The RV Atlantis is Navy owned, but operated by WHOI. It is the only ship that houses Alvin, a “human occupied submersible”. It is one of the largest research vessels owned by the U.S. and yet, it looked like a toy boat compared to the massive military ships next to it preparing to leave port. These ships had to be at least twice the size of the Atlantis. The closest ship had a lot of construction happening on board leading to a lot of activity in the surrounding areas to navigate. Even the Atlantis was busy having forklifts bring luggage and lab equipment on board and I saw a crane carrying a NSF lab on board. 

I was able to drop my luggage off in my room. It is a three person room with a bunk bed and one pull-out from the wall. Luckily, I have nice roommates to make the crowded experience better. We each got a dresser and a small closet to put our stuff into. The bathroom has a small shower and toilet that connects to another bedroom so it locks on both sides. It has a heated lamp which is quite luxurious. 

After settling in a little bit, we unloaded the rest of our stuff starting with the lab equipment. Maybe the most challenging part was figuring out what space we could claim in a shared lab. We put non-skid mats on all of our tables, bolted down our microscopes, and bungeed any boxes/crates that we could to the walls. We needed to secure everything on the tables and also the ground to make sure it wouldn’t slide once we are sea-born. 

To end the day, we got to get off the ship and have a nice Italian dinner.