Day 4 and I get the first dive after the scientists. As soon as I got out on hooka, the big southern stingray I spotted on day 2 came right up to the forward starboard Aquarius leg and covered himself in sand. He has a split in the very front of his body so when it’s in the sand it reminds you of an Atlantic Manta (Manta birostris). All we can figure out is it was caught and the fishing line must have cut the front part of his body. Makes for interesting identification though. During my 4 hour dive I did a lot of pipe and valve cleaning and noticed that the reef is really trying it’s best to claim Aquarius as its own. Not only is there more plant life, but while I was cleaning a valve, a crab came from between the water tank and frame and tried to bite my toes! I think he was trying to tell me to get out of his territory; just like the Damselfish and Sergeant Majors were doing on day two. ( the Damselfish on day two were Brown Chromis (Chromis multilineata)). The amount of growth on the exterior from when I saturated last year is incredible! The most fascinating thing to happen yet was migration of billions of 2mm bugs (Polychaetes of some sort) at around 2100 hours (9:00 PM). It looked like lightning in the sky that instead of going front the clouds to the earth travels from cloud to cloud. It did this in the light at the bow of Aquarius and was incredible. The only visual thing I can thing of was the Nexus in one of the Star Trek movies. FLASH: The microwave was brought down in a very big sealed pot to keep the water out. Mark and I mounted the microwave in place, tried to test it and guess what, it didn’t work! The scientists were drawing out their dive knives and pipettes when they realized it was time for them to dive. To think, saved by a dive…The habitat techs had to work fast and furious. They adjusted the door micro-switches to make the microwave work again. The scientists were once again good-natured and all the Aquarius crew is back to its happy “tortillas and melted cheese” loving self again. More tomorrow.
Today was a late start day, I didn’t get in the water until 1:30 PM, but had a great dive! 10 Permits (Trachinotus falcatus) and 4 Tarpon (Megalops Atlanticus) were swimming under the habitat and watching them just frolic was incredible. The Tarpon were the same ones from yesterday with an addition to the pack (a school of tarpon just doesn’t sound right) and the Permit range from 2 feet to 3½ feet. I only wish the fishermen that fish for sport would come to the ocean’s reef and see these magnificent creatures playing. At one point I was in the middle with a loop in my air hose and the permit were doing loop-da-loops though it. I missed my calling as a circus trainer I guess. I did a big general clean up of the area around Aquarius and found a few small Spotted Moray Eels (Gymnothorax moringa) and quite a few Plumed Scorpionfish (Scorpaena grandicornis).The Schoolmasters (Lutjanus apodus) and the Boga (Inermia vittata) were in perfect synchronic swimming mode. Bogas are fascinating to watch, there can be hundreds of them and they all appear to change direction at the same exact time. It’s truly one of nature’s light shows to see all blue one second and all silver the next. The light plays on them like an un-decided artist’s brush to canvas. When a predatory fish is around, their speed increases incredibly. You can also time just right to be in the middle of the bogas if you are real slow moving, that’s really neat! No microwave! The crew of Aquarius is like a taught string ready to snap at a simple tug. The habitat techs are working hard to keep the scientist calmed, but were not sure how much long we can do it…Hopefully, more tomorrow.
These last 2 days have gone smoothly. We finished putting in the BOA and anchoring down most of the arrays. Dale and I are a buddy team, and Jim and Steve are the other buddy team. We started surveying all of the arrays; this involves Dale doing most of the work. I hold one end of the transect tape while Dale swims it to the next array. From there, he takes compass bearings, and depths. During this time I wait and observe all the creatures around me. He then tugs a few times to let me know he’s ready for me to join him. I had a cool encounter with a trumpetfish who seemed to enjoy the bubbles from my regulator. He had absolutely no fear and I probably could have touched him if I wanted to. I also had a curious Nassau grouper hanging out with me during 2 of the node surveys; I think he just wanted some company. They’re kind of grumpy looking and I wasn’t sure if he wanted me to move out of his way. I also noticed many micro-organisms while I was waiting. Lots of little cleaner shrimp, gobies and blennies, and if I sat still long enough, all the feather duster worms would come out. Tomorrow we have a deep dive planned for the morning. There are a few arrays that go out to about 110 feet. We’ll start our survey out there and then move up to a shallower depth. I like going deeper, I always see spotted eagle rays and turtles. Living down here is still great. Today we had a few visitors. A news crew from The News Hour with Jim Lehrer came down to interview Jim Leichter. It’s nice to see new faces and hear about the weather and land news. I do have a few of the ailments that are associated with wearing a wet wetsuit for 8 hours a day but they’re menial compared to all the neat things I’m doing.
I sleep extremely soundly and the night sounds are really soothing. We hear snapping shrimp and see shadows of large fish go by the view ports. Speaking of which, my bed is calling me right now, all this swimming with the fishes tires me out. Night!
It’s Day 2 of the mission and everything is off to a great start. Our wake up call came at 6 this morning. Waking up underwater is one of the many exciting things about living in the Habitat. But 6:15 it was just starting to get light out on the reef while we sipped our coffee and looked out the view port. Large fish were still out feeding by the lights of the Habitat darting in from time to time to catch their prey. At one point a shower of fish scales came down past the view port — somebody having and somebody else becoming breakfast in one swoop.
After breakfast we staged out for our morning excursion which was 3-1/2 hours down to a depth of 110-ft. Between this morning’s dive and the ones yesterday when we were out for a total of just over 5 hours we have now already deployed most of the large cable array. This system has 100 individual temperature sensors set up as on a grid across the reef and gives us a unique spatial view of the waves of cool water washing on shore. There still a lot to be done, but by late today we expect to have accomplished 90% deployment that took us over a week of surface diving in last year. And, with the extended bottom time available from saturation diving we can make much more careful observations. But these advantages of saturation diving only come with a lot of work from the various support crews before and during the mission. As we relax now for a lunch of delicious re-hydrated camping food our trusty Habitat technicians, the topside Aquarius crew, and our topside support divers are all hard at work.
This is the end of day 2 of my 10th Aquarius mission. I got married last month, so this will give my wife Sue a chance to rearrange the house while I’m away.
So far things are going pretty well with the mission. Jim Leichter knows how to fully utilize the available dive time from the Aquarius. He and his crew have been quite busy.Hal Letts and I are starting to make some progress on the outside habitat maintenance.We have had some large tarpon and permit swimming around the habitat lately. They are a sight to see. Speaking of large, I had to laugh at Dr. Leichter today. He was standing in the water in the wet porch (about waist deep) when Steve Wing said “look behind you Jim!” To Jim’s chagrin, there was a 4 foot (in Jim’s eye’s, a six foot) resident barracuda less than one foot away, sizing him up. Jim leaped up into the dry area of the wet porch in a single bound! Now, I know Jim is not concerned about barracudas in open water, but it is a bit disconcerting to be in a small space with a large snaggle-tooth barracuda giving you the once over. I told him I was laughing with him not at him, but I think Steve was laughing AT him.