Mission & Project Info | NOAA’s Aquarius Undersea Laboratory
Mission Blog

Greetings all,

The NEEMO 6 mission ended yesterday morning on a gorgeous, flat calm Floriday day. The crew finished deco and were guided slowly to the surface by a pair of safety divers. They “splashed up” at approximately 9:00 am. All were healthy and in great spirits. They enjoyed a leisurely lunch of Thai food and spent the afternoon unwinding and resting. We all participated in the splashup party with many of the local people that have supported us in the last few weeks to celebrate the success of the mission. The party took place at a private residence on the ocean, and we all observed a moment of silence at sunset while 7 white doves were released in honor of the Columbia crew. They circled overhead a few times, and then disappeared into the twilight sky.

On behalf of the crew and Topside Team, we’d like to extend our thanks to all those who supported this mission and made it possible:

• JSC’s Engineering Directorate, for your vision, funding, manpower, hardware, and real spaceflight engineering objectives to make the mission meaningful;
• JSC’s Mission Ops Directorate, for the majority of the manpower that keeps this project alive year by year, as well as your unflagging support;
• JSC’s Flight Crew Ops Directorate, the manpower, support, and (majority of the) crew;
• The staff at the National Undersea Research Center for running a world class operation, keeping Aquarius viable, and keeping the whole operation safe and sound;
• Previous NEEMO crews who helped pave the way; and
• The families and friends of all of us who’ve been away so long making this mission a success. We appreciate your sacrifices

Stay tuned for NEEMO 7, our first international mission, which will be focused on telemedicine and telerobotic operations. We are already gearing up for it, as it starts in October.

NEEMO Topside Team out.

Well it’s around 0400 on our last day, we just passed 7 fsw and we’ll be taking in the sea breezes in another 4 1/2 hours. I’m “driving the bus” presently, what our guys like to call exhausting the habitat back to surface pressure, driving us home. Everyone else is asleep, but we got this far under the steady hand and watchful eyes of Roger Garcia and my fellow hab tech Joe March, who took their turns driving when we started up this road at 1600 yesterday. Roger came in as a third hab tech for deco, but primarily for monitoring our early oxygen breathing periods, so
Joe and I could join the other aquanauts on O2 and not be burdened with
exhausting the habitat on its prescribed ascent schedule. Of course there’s another reason Roger is in here, he’s also serving as Diving Medical Technician for anything that might present during decompression, and I personally don’t know a finer DMT than Roger, not to mention being my saturation partner this time last year for another ten day sat. So far his work has been minimal, but poor Tara has an ear infection that started yesterday and is keeping her awake tonight, but he and our Navy DMO (Diving Medical Officer) Doc Sparks have that in control already.

The ten days flew by down here, there were great days when I could get out for 5-6 hours diving for exterior valve maintenance, then there were not so great days when all I could squeeze out was a thirty minute dive to do the daily exterior systems’ checks. One guy who certainly earned his keep on this mission was my partner Joe, without his ability to troubleshoot all the communication issues going on at once, this mission would have been a bust. Joe sacrificed much of his desired daily diving release to stay inside to see that all the media events, wireless dive comms to Houston, and yes, even a live link to the International Space Station, came off as planned for the NEEMO team. And he did it all with that huge smile he’s worn since becoming a diver, and I can’t say I was always smiling down here. My hat goes off to Joe, he pulled this one off for the team.

I could fill pages with all the help our topside NURC divers lent to this mission, equipment supply for this mission was beyond our normal load, and all that gear can only get here through the hard work of the “potting crew”, which included our big 30″ diameter dry pot for this mission, and those guys made it look easy. Hal, Billy, Thor, Ross, Roger, great job,
and today will be another major haul out to end the mission. I cannot forget mentioning the support we got during the mission from NASA NBL divers Brent Fergurson and Greg Sims (if I spelled this wrong I’m sorry, but it should be spelled w.o.r.k.h.o.r.s.e!), Navy Experimental Diving Unit divers Tim Moebious and Adolph Herrera, US Naval Academy intern Tim Letts, and NOAA’s Jeff Kelly. They were all involved heavily with the potting and other activities, I know our guys appreciated the help and we thank.

Trying to recognize everyone is surely going to get me into trouble as I’m bound to miss someone. All the media events would not have come off without the link through Kea back at the base, as well as putting all the journals and pictures on the web page, way to go Sis. To Otter for leading the charge with the afternoon assaults and your hand in the deliveries, to James and Dominic, the forgotten ones who watch over us on the graveyard shift through the night. And last, but certainly not least to my friend the “HOM” (Habitat Operations Manager), Jim Buckley, who had to coordinate all this wealth of tasking and people with us down here and the topside NEEMO team as well, great job Jim.

Who am I forgetting, well the remaining folks at NURC, Otto, Mike, and Diana, the countless people at NASA EXPOC, the NEEMO topside team, and oh yes, my fellow aquanauts, John, Wheels, Tara, and Nick. They are the stars of this show and I know don’t mind letting me mention all the little guys behind the scenes. They have been a pleasure to be locked up with for ten days, and I hope we have not seen the last of them. They
were loaded down with tasks this mission and they stuck to their guns to get it done. When they hit walls, they regrouped and charged ahead again, I give them much credit for all they accomplished. Most of all I thank them for letting me demolish, I mean disassemble, their Waterlab project, that was four hours of joyful diving.

To close, I want to thank my good friends Bob Barth and Capt Mark Helmkamp for getting us where we are today in many ways, and by continuing to foster cooperative efforts with the Navy and NURC for assistance with equipment and manpower. And on the days when being down here seemed to start taking its toll, there would come this magical call from either of them that reminded me why I have the best job in the world.

Another ten day mission starts August 9, hope you’ll join us.

Well, I’ve just completed my 100% oxygen pre-breathe for our decompression. The interior of the habitat is slowly being vented back to a sea level atmosphere. I believe the current depth is equivalent to about 21 feet as I type. The legs of the habitat still firmly rest at 63 feet, but we are essentially climbing the water column, so to speak, very slowly over a 16-hour period. Having been at depth for a period of time and breathing compressed air, our tissues have become saturated with nitrogen. If we rose too quickly to the surface, that excess nitrogen that we have stored in our bodies would come out of solution and cause what is known as decompression sickness (DCS). Any time you SCUBA dive at depth of an extended period of time, you risk contracting the bends if you ascend too rapidly to the surface. There are other medical conditions that could arise, but our primary concern is DCS.

Our last two days have been filled with a myriad of events. Educational outreach through video-teleconferencing, a visit by reporters from a major news network, exercise on the resistive exercise device, stretching while floating outside the habitat on an air umbilical, coral science, wireless monitor evaluations, electronic tracking device evals, and on and on and on. There has been a lot of work that has kept us on our toes.

During the interview with the news program, I was asked, “Should we be down here? Do we really belong here?” I responded with how important it is to be here and most importantly, why we need to be in space, that we go where our minds take us. Taking that answer further, I would have to say, we go to places like this to learn more about ourselves. Whether it is in the ocean or above the planet. We learn more about how we impact the world we live in by looking at it from a different perspective. Looking out the window and seeing a fish swim by with a large hook in its mouth, trailing a foot of fishing line. Seeing a bottle buried in the sand and realizing a fish has now made it his home. The habitat we live in is completely foreign to this environment, yet its outer structure has become a refuge to thousands of fish. It provides a sanctuary as well as a food source. We don’t belong, yet we do.

The same can be said of our journeys in space. It is an environment that is inhospitable to humans, yet we have found a way to live and work productively for long periods of time. And the benefits of our efforts have profoundly changed the technological face of the Earth. I also believe it has deeply influenced our appreciation of the world we live in and strengthened our role as stewards of our environment.

Throughout my career, I have always heard the term “scope-locked” used to describe someone who did not see the big picture. They were too engrossed in the details to stop and look at how everything comes together. Most often the solution to a problem lies in seeing how all of the pieces fit together. I believe living and working underwater or over the planet does just that, it give us the big picture. And this picture should keep growing. It should not end in low-Earth orbit or the depths of the sea, but should continue beyond the horizon.

Greetings!

NEEMO 6 is almost in the history books. They have had a very successful and rewarding mission, which has run the gamut from investigating new engineering hardware, software and procedures, to learning to be proxy scientists on the coral reef outside their home. They’ve done multiple educational outreach and public affairs events (see Space.com and, this weekend, CNN and CNN.com for the latest), built waterlab, tagged and characterized the excursion lines around the habitat, and worked with a mission control team in Houston. All the while they were using new timeline and procedure viewing tools operationally for the first time.

As you now know, the crew has spent the last 9 days at a depth of 47 feet. At that depth, their bodies have taken on excess amounts of nitrogen which has been absorbed in their body tissues and must be removed. In order to return to the surface, they will have to go thru a 16 hour process called “decompression” or “deco”. This is a very safe procedure which is accomplished in several steps: 1) The crew breathes pure oxygen for 3 short intervals to help decrease or “washout” the nitrogen in their blood; 2) the main living quarters are “locked out” from the “wet porch” area and the internal habitat pressure is slowly brought to the surface pressure by exhausting the internal air to the surface (14 hours); and finally 3) the habitat is “blown down” to the 47 foot level again in just a few minutes. Then the hatch is opened and the crew swims slowly to the surface under the watchful eye of escorting safety divers. They should be on the surface at ~ 9:00 am on Wednesday, where we (the Topside Team) will be waiting on the boat to take them home under the expert supervision of Otto Rutten, the Base Manager of the NURC operations here in Key Largo. There are few people in this world as good at what they do as Otto – what a nice feeling to know he’ll be there to get you safely home…

When we get back tomorrow, the crew will get a chance to relax and enjoy the fresh air. They’re prohibited from leaving the area for 24 hrs – 48 hrs if leaving by air (which they all are.) This gives the doc a chance to closely observe them for any signs of decompression problems, and treat them immediately if any show up. That’s just a precaution, though – this approach to decompression has been done hundreds of times successfully so far and is considered to be quite safe and conservative. They’re not really supposed to leave the base tomorrow, but we’ve arranged for their doc – Dr. Scott Sparks, on loan from the Navy – to accompany them to lunch tomorrow so they can have some “real” food. They’ll spend the afternoon relaxing, washing clothes, packing up (and hopefully helping us pack all this engineering hardware to be shipped back to Houston!) In the evening we’ll have the traditional “Splashup” party with our NURC hosts to celebrate the successful conclusion of the mission. Part of the NEEMO 7 crew, who have been in town for the last few days getting some preliminary training for their mission, will be joining us. NEEMO 7 starts in October…not much time to rest up!

Thanks for following along.

- NEEMO Topside Team

Greetings!

Ever heard of Stephanocoenia Michelini or Siderastrea Siderea? How about Porites Astreiodes, Montastaea Cavernosa, or Agarcia Agaticites? These are not exotic new diseases being studied on NEEMO 6, but rather types of coral that our crew has been working vigorously to measure, photograph, and document!

The crew have become proxy scientists for the National Undersea Research Center in the realm of coral science. Our NEEMO crews help add to the long term database on coral health in the Keys, and at the same time develop basic skills that will be required on their space flights: learning about something they probably don’t know much about, and being the hands and eyes of the “real” scientist who can’t be there. This week the crew embarked on 3 coral science dives, each with ExPOC support. During these dives, the aquanauts used transect lines to cordon off an area in which they worked. Within that area they then selected the largest corals to study. After selecting them, they measured the coral and recorded the data. Then they made an evaluation of the coral that they were studying and estimated the percent living vs. dead coral on each colony. They recorded their answers on underwater slates, and also took a short video clip of each coral so the species could be identified later. This field research, coupled with the dynamic underwater environment, creates a challenging task for our aquanauts and allows them to demonstrate and utilize both their diving and scientific skills. This was the most challenging diving they’ll do this mission, and it’s fitting that it be at the end when their skills have been honed to a high degree.

We hope that these dives provide NOAA with data that presents an overview of the health of various areas of the reef. Our data from this study will be compared to long term research at the site to evaluate the overall condition of the coral reef. Alarmingly, data has revealed that only 7.3% of the coral reef in the Florida Keys is living. Coral reefs are the rainforests of the oceans. An amazingly high percentage of the total species found in the seas live on coral reefs. In recent years coral reefs have declined dramatically around the world. Understanding this decline, and the human contributions to it, may give us the knowledge to reverse the trend. While our contribution to this study may be a small one, we are proud of the relationship that has developed between NASA and NOAA through this and the previous NASA NEEMO missions.

The basic tools of Coral Science

The NEEMO Aquanauts have seen a wide variety of sea life on the reef. From the grouper who tends to hang around near the habitat to the barracuda who made waterlab their new home, to the aileron-rolling nurse shark they observed on the night dive last night, the NEEMO 6 crew has embraced their new environment and taken the time to stop and enjoy the view. A large barracuda tends to hang out near the viewport which is near the galley table, and the crew has named him BOB (as in Big Ol’ Barracuda… actually, we understand Craig Cooper, the senior habitat technician on this mission, came up with this name. Clearly he’s been hanging out with us NASA people too long when he starts using acronyms to name the fish )
One of the crewmembers confided last night that he was “forever changed by this experience.” We know what he means. It starts out as mission designed to be a space analog and make better prepared astronauts (among other things.) But along the way you find that you’ve developed a bond with the vibrant, dynamic life cycle of the sea during the course of the mission. We know that they are very conflicted right now as their mission nears its end: excited to be joining their friends and family again, happy that they’ve accomplished a successful mission, and yet amazed that the time has flown by so quickly. They can scarcely believe it’s almost over, and we’re confident they’re all a little bit sad it has to end so soon.

This weekend ISS Science Officer Mike Fincke called and requested that we set up a videoconference for him to talk with the Topside Team and professionals at NURC. The ISS Flight Control team and Kea Foreman at NURC made it happen today – seamlessly. It was standing room only on our side, as all of his friends here eagerly greeted him. (It was floating room only on his side, of course.) Mike instinctively understands something that most people don’t realize: that for every successful mission like this, there are a lot of unsung heroes behind the scenes making it happen. In this case, the crew at NURC is definitely in that category. They keep Aquarius – the only operational undersea research facility in the world – operating year after year, and take justifiable pride in doing so. They provide two professional aquanauts – in this case Craig Cooper and Joe March – for each mission to keep our NASA crew healthy and safe. They man a watch desk 24/7 during each mission with great diligence. They’re ready at the drop of a hat to get on a boat on a stormy night and restart the generators on the Life Support Buoy. And they do it all with a smile. There’s not a one of them who can’t wear at least 3 hats with ease. Being recognized by Mike today was really a treat, because he’s seen first hand the professionalism they display, and he took the time to compliment them on it. It was a nice treat for the Topside Team, too, as we’ve all become fast friends with him.

We’re winding down… Thanks for staying with us!
- NEEMO Topside Team