Deadly, dangerous, deceitful. Scientists are all of these. Whether it takes form in freezing helpless krill, kicking their last feeble kicks as they near dewars of liquid nitrogen, or sneaking up on sleeping whales, smackingContinue reading
Category: marine studies
Palmer station (Wed., 5/6/09) – Underwater Leopard Seal Video
Dave managed to take some spectacular underwater video of two leopard seals On May 6th, Dave used our underwater video camera to get some amazing footage of leopard seals swimming next to their Zodiac asContinue reading
Wilhelmina Bay (Thurs., 5/7/09) – Hitting a Trampoline with a Chopstick
These are by far the most rotund and plump whales I have ever been around. When they rise, the span of their backs looks like a small parking lot. We returned overnight to our homeContinue reading
Errera Channel (Wed., 5/6/09) – Leopard Seals
Sometimes days don’t go quite as planned, but opportunities do arise. We started the day with a stiff breeze (>40knts) so we were not able to splash the small boats first thing as we hadContinue reading
Piccard Cove (Tues., 5/5/09) – It’s a bird! It’s a plane! Its an Arnoux’s Beaked Whale!
After a full night sleep free of listening to: SchshhhhhhhhhhthchhBEEEEEEPhhthhchhchhhcracklBEEEEP snaphrhchhchchchchrhchhcsh the team woke up well rested and ready to go at it again! Unfortunately for us the wind had picked to a nice 40+Continue reading
Nansen Island (Mon., 5/4/09) – Stage 8 of Radio Tracking
After two days of intense searching we managed to relocate and recover our wayward tag just before dusk this afternoon. For most of last night and all of this morning we were convinced that theContinue reading
At Sea (Sun., 5/3/09) – White Noise
schshhhhhhhhhhthchhchhhhhhthhchhchhhcrackleshcchsnaphrhchhchchch chilechrhchhcshhehhchhehhhfhhhehhhehhshhehhhshhehehchhchhhhh hthhchhchhhcrackleshcchsnaphrhchhchchchcehshhshchshhshfhschshhshhchs hhchshhchhshshrhhshchilechhshhhhthchhchhhhhhthhchhchhhcrackleshcch snaphrhchpeppershshshchchsahchthachdhahhahahhfhhhehhhehhshhehhhs hhehehchhchhhhhhthchshshchhchshchhchhchhhhhhthhchhchhhcracklesh cchsnaphrhchhchchchcshchshchshsnap *beep*……. We have had a couple of busy days this weekend. Yesterday we surveyed the southern portion of Piccard Cove and had 68 visual detections of marine predators.Continue reading
Antarctica (Sat., 5/2/09) – Grease ice, brash ice, bergie bits and krill pancakes
After about 6 hours in a small zodiac with an air temperature of -5 degrees C, I stopped feeling two of my toes on my right foot. However, I still had a huge smile onContinue reading
Piccard Cove (Fri., 5/1/09) – A Cove of Whales and a Blizzard of Penguins
The home page on the ship’s intranet said that today was a good day to be a scientist a truer word was never spoken. The home page on the ship’s intranet said that today wasContinue reading
Palmer Station (Thurs., 4/30/09) – Game On!
Yesterday we pulled into Palmer and effectively yelled “game on!” From 0800-1200 the fish team worked with LMG and Palmer crew to offload all the fish they had trawled and trapped over the last threeContinue reading