Blogs from the R/V Falkor off Ontong Java

CTD array headed down. SOI/ Mark Heckman

Have you been following along? It is 4 a.m. here on the R/V Falkor off of Ontong Java Atoll. I am midway through my midnight to 8 a.m. seafloor mapping shift. Mostly I just watch while my shift partners (who actually know what they are doing), make sure all is well. The other night, a sharp rise on the port side of the seafloor map prompted my night shift partner Tomer Ketter, to call up to the bridge and turn the boat around. We reversed course, mapped a new seamount and then went back on track.

There are new blog posts every day, either by myself or the Chief Scientist, or whomever in the science crew I can convince to write. I will also be on the radio with Carlie on the 28th.

Some topics so far:
10/15 Converging on a Point (Getting everyone in to Pohnpei from around the world)
10/15-Present Mapping with Mike - Cruise accounts from the Chief Scientist
10/18 Using the CTD to Calibrate the Multibeam Sonar (less technical than it sounds and great images taken by putting my camera on a very long stick off the back of the ship)
10/19 Amelia Earhart and Nukumanu Atoll (yup, we are off the last confirmed position for Amelia Earhart)
10/20 The Meaning of Life or at Least a Multibeam Acquisition Screen (a look at the coloful screens we watch 24-7)
10/23 Flying in Darkness - Charting Unknown Reefs at Night
and our most current:
10/24 Colored Lines - Decyphering the CTD Code (again, less technical than it sounds. I am also aiming some of these for HS students studying sea floor mapping)

Next up will be an entry on the barracuda that ended up on deck and the results thereof. 

Aloha!

Mark

Section of atoll we have been mapping. SOI/Tomer Ketter