|
|
|
|
"Where are you going to find another group of people doing such good work?" said an elated Karson, chief scientist on the expedition that has been using three state of the art Woods Hole devices - the towed DSL 120 side scan sonar, the Argo II remotely operated camera array, and the manned submarine Alvin - to probe the geology of a large canyon two miles underwater.
"It is such a pleasure to work on board a ship with such fabulous capabilities," Karson added. "And the Woods Hole technicians and Alvin crew have been fantastic."
Funded by the the titanium-hulled Alvin is a major national resource for research on the ocean bottom.
"Alvin is now the only deep diving submarine asset for the US," said Expedition Leader Pat Hickey, who stays aboard Atlantis as the sub's off-shore manager.
Watching the sub get successfully launched each morning during a 15-day period that ended today, a casual observer could become overcomplacent about what it took to prepare Alvin over and over for Hess Deep's crushing pressures and cold temperatures.
By 6 a.m. each morning, with dawn still just a pink and purple glimmer to the east, Phil Forte and Eric Norby from the Deep Submergence Group (DSG) were already beginning a lengthy Alvin pre-dive checkup. Working in the sub's tall hangar on Atlantis's aft (rear) deck, Forte concentrated on the submersible's mechanical equipment while Norby dealt with its electronics.
Both men are engineers, and both are in training to become Alvin pilots, a job that combines, skill, stress and exhilaration. Meanwhile, the pilot for that day's dive would already be down in Alvin's cockpit, going through his own check in the same way that commercial jet captains do.
Alvin "drivers'" work description include the ability to "be crunched up like a pretzel for 10 hours" in the sub's cramped interior, said pilot Matt Heintz, one of three (including Hickey) aboard Atlantis for the Hess Deep mission.. The job's responsibilities include "three people's lives to be concerned with," he said, which on the Hess Deep expedition included watching for "potential rock slides."
Before 8 a.m., both Atlantis and DSG personnel would converge to move Alvin between its hangar and the special heavy-duty A-frame crane mounted on the ship's back stern. Meanwhile, others would have climbed into the aft control station (nicknamed the "doghouse") above Alvin's hangar.
Two more snorkel and flipper-wearing "swimmers" - either from Atlantis's crew or from the DSG - would have positioned themselves on the sub's small deck even as the doghouse operators ordered the complex A-frame to gently drop Alvin into the water.
It was the swimmers' job to stand upright on the teetering sub until it finished lowering, then untie the thick, braided "main line" that linked Alvin with A-frame. They made both tasks look deceptively easy even though they were potentially dangerous. After completing their mission, the swimmers would then dive into the equatorial Pacific, a shark habitat, and swim (swiftly) to a waiting motor launch.
After Alvin returned each evening - another choreography of A-frame, ship, motor launch and swimmers - it would be the DSG group's responsibility to fix anything that went wrong in time for Alvin to be launched again the next day, bright and early.
Before Alvin's next-day rollout, though, some of those same people may also have pulled shifts in the control van where DSG operators directed the movements of Argo II photographic surveys throughout almost every night until April 6.
Other Argo II handlers aboard Atlantis include navigator Thomas Crook, a long time Wood Hole electronics technician who was on a similar watch in 1986 when a previous generation of Argo first spotted the wreckage of the ocean liner HMS Titanic.
As their participation in Alvin operations implies, this everyone-can-do-anything attitude also extends to the crew of the Atlantis, who operate "the most high-tech ship in the US," according to lean and tall First Mate Gardiner Doughty, the ship's second-in-command.
Completed just in 1997 for the Navy, and operated by Woods Hole under a charter agreement with the Atlantis was specifically built to serve as mother ship for the Alvin and - simultaneously - other high tech towed and robotic scientific probes.
Atlantis isn't just able to plow through the water at a cruising speed of 12 knots. During Hess Deep, it also strolled at less than a knot while towing the DSL 120 along the underwater canyon's rim, crawled at one foot per second while nudging Argo II up and down the rift's steep walls, or hovered in place all day long while Alvin descended, explored, and returned from two miles down.
Sitting in one spot near the equator can be an unearthly spectator experience, especially on calm days like today, when the Pacific can take on the appearance of rolling glass under a fishbowl cloud-dappled sky. On a choppier recent afternoon, a swim-by of curious pilot whales caused Hess Deep researchers to momentarily abandon computers and rock samples to dash for their cameras.
Hovering and creeping are hard tasks for a ship though, because Atlantis is constantly buffeted by currents, winds and heaving swells - often coming from different directions simultaneously. Nevertheless, Atlantis can stay within three feet of one point indefinitely, Doughty said, because of its computerized "dynamic positioning" system and its "thruster" propulsion system.
Thrusters are water movers that swivel in any direction, and Atlantis has three of them: two stern (rear)-mounted propellers and one bow (front) jet that operates something like a firehose nozzle. With dynamic positioning - a very advanced form of autopilot - as soon as the ship begins to wander off course, an onboard computer will set things right by activating the right thruster combinations.
The three thruster controls on Atlantis's 53-foot tall bridge also serve as substitutes for the old style wooden ship's wheel, that vital stage prop in so many swashbuckling adventures.
"There is no more ship's wheel," said Doughty. "We drive the ship completely with the thrusters. And this ship handles like a Cadillac. It's probably the easiest handling ship I have ever been on."
Both the ship's computer and its bridge crew always know where Atlantis is because of the world wide satellite "global positioning system" (GPS). "GPS has revolutionized navigation," said Tim Logan, Atlantis's Electronics Technician for the Hess Deep cruise. And because Atlantis is technically a Navy ship, it can navigate with the aid of classified GPS encryption codes that are more accurate than civilian GPS.
Logan said his Electronics Technician title is a recent replacement for Radio Officer, a designation that is being phased out because of another revolutionary satellite and computer innovation known as the Global Marine Distress Safety System, or GMDSS.
By pushing two buttons up in the bridge's instrument-filled Radio and Chart Room, Logan - or anyone else aboard Atlantis - can now send out a distress call that automatically broadcasts vital information about the ship and its position. By the same token, GMDSS will automatically alert Atlantis's crew of other ships in distress.
"Everyone in the world will know," Logan said. "There will be no doubt."
Meanwhile, Atlantis can probe the ocean floor with two computer aided sonar systems known as Bathy-2000 and Seabeam, said Charlie Lewis, who has been serving as Science Support Group Technician during the Hess Deep expedition.
Bathy-2000 bounces sound waves off the bottom to draw profiles of the sediments there, added Lewis. Meanwhile, Seabeam uses a more elaborate array of sound transmitters and detectors to "paint in 3-D," he continued. "Seabeam paints the kind of picture that people like to see."
While Lewis normally holds Logan's job on Atlantis, he is temporarily taking care of all the ship's scientific computers and associated electronic equipment, which are located in different laboratory areas throughout the ship. These devices are kept happily protected from the equatorial heat by the ship's two 110-ton air conditioning plants.
Air conditioning is just one of the vital services provided in Atlantis's immaculate, state-of-the-art (and well soundproofed) engine room area. Another is the ship's 12,750-gallon fresh water supply, which is converted from seawater by three different desalination plants.
One desalinator distills fresh water with waste heat from the ship's huge diesel powered generator units. Working the same way as in rairoad diesel locomotives, those units convert diesel combustion energy into electricity that then runs Atlantis's bow and stern thrusters as well as supplying the ship's current.
In the process, Atlantis consumes an average of 2,000 gallons of diesel fuel a day during scientific operations, and as much as 5,200 gallons a day when the ship is en route to and from port.
Atlantis's engineering department keeps the ship running around the clock with just eight people: three "oilers," a first, second and third engineer, and a marine electrician, all working under Chief Engineer Kevin Fisk.
An official rating in the modern merchant marine, the title of oiler is a holdover from days when engine room operations were messier that today's. Oilers now "provide extra sets of eyes, ears and hands to assist the engineers," said Fisk. "And that does not necessarily mean that the oiler know less than the engineer. Many times it's the opposite."
Other old nautical titles that are still official merchant marine ratings (supervised by the include "mates," "able bodied seamen" (ABs), and "ordinary seamen" (OSs).
Atlantis has three ABs, one for each shift, who stand bridge watches under the first, second or third mates. While ABs and mates must staff the bridge around the clock, Atlantis's three OSs are theoretically day workers.
But theory and practice are two different things on a research vessel that operates at all hours, acknowledged Wayne Bailey, Atlantis's appropriately-burley deck boss - or boatswain (pronounced "bosun"). The reality is that OSs "will work until the wee hours of morning hauling in science gear," Bailey added through his thick handle bar moustache. "You have to be much more well-rounded to be an efficient and capable seaman aboard a research vessel. It's tough, because the work load is huge."
A vivid reminder of that is the array of equipment - some for Hess Deep and more for yet-to-come expeditions on the ship's current cruise schedule - that is lashed down to almost every available space on Atlantis's decks.
Operating an assortment of different hoisting cranes and rigging, Atlantis's crew serves the needs not only of "mud slingers" (geologists) but also of "water catchers" (oceanographers) and "bug hunters" (biologists), Bailey said, repeating popular shipboard slang designations.
"This is a good group, not only personally but professionally," continued Bailey, a 26 year veteran mariner. "Everybody pitches in together to get the job done. They take a good deal of pride in what they do. They want to be the best at it in the world. And this is a lot more of a family than you'll find on a lot of ships."
This camaraderie - as well as professional pride - are also evident on the mess deck, a natural gathering center for all aboard Atlantis. The crew, sporting an unusually large array of tattoos, seemed to mingle well with the scientists during the last month. And everyone had an usually large of array of food choices thanks to the creative efforts of Atlantis Steward Carl Wood and Cook Marc Leandro.
Wood and Leandro have regularly served up dinner items like leg of lamb in orange molasses, Australian mahi mahi, prime ribs and yellow fin tuna, not to forget boursin cheese omelets, fresh made oatmeal and a variety of fresh fruit for breakfast.
They stretched out the lettuce supply as long as possible by keeping it at near freezing temperatures in Atlantis's large walk-in refrigerators. But, at the end, mess attendant Linda Bartholomee had to throw away much more than they could keep.
Four days before the cruise's end, though, the cantaloupe, kiwi fruit, and mangoes seem just fine. And so does the fresh milk reserves, which they keep frozen before use.
The larder is also supplemented by occasional nighttime fishing forays, including Hickey's phenomenal recent success at catching squid. Atlantis Capt. George Silva also pulled in fresh tuna for the March 24 on-deck cookout, though his biggest trophy arrived largely consumed by an apparent shark.
"This is my first time out at sea ever, and the first time ever cooking for this many people," confessed Leandro, who previously worked for Cafe Fanny, a "standup French" restaurant in Berkeley, Calif.
"A lot of it is improvisation," he added of his cooking, though he said he benefitted from the files of a previous steward who left the ship at Easter Island (a trip that also provided the mahi mahi supply).
"To have a three-person steward's department that has to feed 53 people three times a day is unheard of in the world of merchant shipping," said Silva, a bearded, affable graduate of the who has spent most of his career working aboard tankers, container ships and tugs.
"This ship, because of the nature of the work, can switch gears in a heartbeat," added Silva, who like many others aboard was clad informally in shorts. "There is an atmosphere and an attitude out here that I can see. This ship is unique in the sense that it is not a commercial venture but is instead intended for scientific research.
"We can carry up to 30 people in the science party. We are always seeing new faces around here, almost like a passenger ship in certain ways. There are scientists with different interests: biologists, meteorologists, geologists, oceanographers. They keep me alive and interested. I never know what the next cruise is going to bring.
"And we have a very positive, upbeat, hard working crew who are very considerate, perceptive and insightful people."
They are also very good at playing ping pong. You read it here first that Atlantis oiler Phil "Mongoose" Harlbutt prevailed over geologist Steve "The Wurst" Hurst in the Hess Deep championship table tennis competition in Atlantis's main lab.
| ||||||||||||||
|
|
