Mission Journal 29 — Craig McKinley: Mission Day 6: Saturday, October 16th, 2004
Today is mission day 6. This morning we went on a dawn dive. We left the habitat at 6:30 am when it was dark. With our lights on, we made our way to a patch of coral 400 ft from the habitat. It was pitch black except for a small beacon of light coming from the surface. After some consideration, we realized this was the moon beaming its light through the water column. We then waited for sun rise.
Slowly, as the sun rose on the surface, a blue cone of light developed above us. This blue cone became a portal through which light could enter our world. The ocean floor slowly became illuminated and our surroundings were revealed to us.
This blue cone slowly expanded to fill our visibility range and more and more light flooded down to us. Over a period of 30 minutes, we entered our daytime.
And so for you on the surface of the earth, there is a sunrise on the eastern horizon, and there is a sunset on the western horizon. For us under the surface of the earth, there is a cone creation event centered directly above each of us that allows light to enter our column, and there is a cone collapse event again centered directly above each of us that takes our light away.
And so you could say that in our world “the sun rises and sets on each of us every day”. That’s why even a bad day in the water column is better than a good day above the water column.