Saturday July 16, 2011

Day 4 of Leg 1 started with normal ROV dive preparations at 0600, and the vehicle was in the water by 0630. Today's primary objectives were to charge the batteries powering the D-ESP and to exchange its external battery pack. Once that was accomplished we planned to collect sediment cores nearby. The best-laid plans are often thwarted by the unexpected. Soon after the launch of the ROV, the umbilical that feeds power to the Doc Ricketts was damaged requiring immediate recovery of the ROV. The bad news was that the damaged portion of the umbilical cable had to be cut away and reconnected - a process that takes a full day of work. The umbilical is a bundle of copper wires that carry power down to the ROV and glass optical fibers for data communications. Reconnection of optical fibers is a delicate operation when done on land, but doing this at sea on a rolling ship is another matter. It is more art than science, careful polishing of the broken ends of the fibers is done until the beam of light transmitted through the fiber is not strongly attenuated. Repair is continuing as I write this daily update. Camera-shy Eric and Brian are patiently polishing and testing the fibers using 10-power goggles and high intensity lamps.
 
The good news - Oceanographers always go to sea with contingency plans. 
So, what did we do while the Doc Ricketts was being repaired? The Clague group spun into action and prepared Roxy the 'Rock Crusher' for deployment off the stern of the Western Flyer. Roxy is a medieval-looking steel weight with numerous small cups of soft wax arranged around its base and upper shaft. It is used to sample the glassy basalt flows that pave the seafloor within Axial Caldera. Roxy is lowered on a wire spooled off the stern of the Western Flyer, and it smashes into the seafloor shattering the glassy basalt flows trapping glass shards in the soft wax. Jenny is the chief cook. To prepare the cups, she presses gobs of soft wax into the cups that are attached to the Roxy. When Roxy returns to deck, wax from each cup is melted in a crockpot, releasing the glass shards, which are cleaned and dried for analysis back on shore. 

[three photos - Jenny preparing wax cups - DSC_6713_jenny.jpg; Vinny preparing Roxy for deployment - DSC_6704_roxy.jpg; Vinny closeup - DSC_6709_vinny.jpg (Roxy not well displayed]

Meanwhile, crack ESP engineers Doug and Scott set about testing new filtering strategies for the next generation of ESP systems ('Gen3'). Compared to the D-ESP monster that weighs in at over 4,300 pounds in air, plans for Gen3 ESP are to slim it down so it can ride in small AUVs and drifting moorings occupying a volume of about 4 basketballs. Gen3 ESP will require radically different approaches to sample collection, preparations and analysis. Doug and Scott are doing some fundamental groundwork while having a bit of fun in the lab.

[photo mosaic of Doug filtering water and Scott taking notes - Doug_Scott_filtering.jpg] 

Brent was successful today in communicating with D-ESP from the ship using an acoustic modem. These are very slow devices, but in a pinch, can give a status report. The report from D-ESP - "All is well".  [Brent showing victory sign after successfully communicating with D-ESP - DSC_6715_brent.jpg]

If all goes well tonight, the Doc Ricketts will dive tomorrow, same time and mission as today.

--Bill Ussler