Last night I went out on hookah again. You always see something different at night. There were some interesting bioluminescent critters out and about. When I have a few extra minutes it’s fun to throw on another weight belt and walk around.

This morning it is Friday May 25, 2001 and it is the fifth day of the mission. It’s the last full day of diving before we begin decompression, tomorrow. I’m really getting used to being down here. If you could use the word routine to describe our habits here, then this is a routine I could enjoy. Today we are going to try to finish up some work before we begin pre-decompression preparations.

And what a couple of days it’s been. Yesterday, we left the habitat about 8:30 am, and what do we see when we arrive, mass sponge spawning. Every other barrel sponge was like a chimney, streaming larvae into the water column. These sponges are literally like giant barrels, and some were filled with eggs. We’d fan out the sponge, so it was completely empty, and within minutes it was full again. Can you imagine how much energy these things are just throwing into the water, hoping that some will land on the reef? The few larvae that actually make it that far are then have to compete with algae and corals for extremely limited open space to grow and survive. Watching the angel fishes and wrasses circle around the spawning sponges, gobbling up whatever they can get to, I figure most of the sponge larvae never even make it to the reef. It was a sight I had never seen in all of my visits to the reef, definitely pretty amazing. Oh, and don’t worry, we took plenty of video.

Yesterday was also Will’s birthday, one of the few people to ever turn 21 under the sea. Our handy lab techs made a birthday cake while we were away. Little Debbie Swiss Cake rolls, covered in Butterfingers, oh and a glow stick as a candle. And our trusty surface support crew also brought down some sushi from the local grocery store for a birthday feast. A birthday to remember. Feel free to drop him a belated birthday hello.

Well, it’s back to work this morning. It’s out to the Pinnacle Site for sponge surveys. Our last full day of work. Time does fly down here.

About midway through my grooming, an Arrow Crab hopped aboard to finish the job. He must have been the supervisor. He finished off the missed spots. About this time, a Spotted Moray Eel stuck his head out of a hole, just inches from my hand. I guess I was intruding on his appointment. The cleaner shrimp must have put up a new sign as a Dentist Office, because Mr. Moray opened his mouth and the cleaner shrimp quickly began giving him a cleaning that any Dental Hygienist would envy. I admired their work for a while, bid them adieu, and continued my tour of the reef.

Sometimes the little things are the most fascinating!

It doesn’t take much to realize the marvel of your situation when you’re watching a spotted eagle ray fly by your window. Likewise, when an air filter becomes dislodged it makes you take note of your dependence on the life support systems of your underwater home. This is day three of my first Aquarius mission.

Just so people don’t get alarmed, the air filter that got dislodged was a redundant filter to a non-essential air system. At no time did this present a threat to the safety of the crew. It was easily fixed by the expert crew of habitat technicians (that’d be me and Otter). The episode actually was quite exciting. There’s no better way to learn about something than to try to fix it under pressure. Soon after it was fixed the Aquanauts returned to their work on the reef.

Afterward I was able to go out on hookah to trace out some exterior plumbing and perform the ritual scrubbing of valves. Most of the air supplies to the habitat are routed externally and enter at various places on the habitat hull. The best way to get a good picture in your head of the habitat as a system is to manually follow each pipe to see exactly where it goes.

I hope to get a chance to go out on hookah for a night dive at some point. Going outside here is kind of like going out in the winter. You’re excited to go but you look forward to the warmth when you come back inside. Still, I’d stay out there all day if I could.

The habitat techs try to get out in the water on a hookah diving rig for at least two hours a day. The hookah rig consists of a hose that’s attached to the habitat air supply. This allows us to work around the habitat without bulky scuba gear. It’s nice to get out into the water, but we try to get some work done at the same time. Mixing business and pleasure.

Today we did a live remote broadcast program with the Fort Lauderdale Museum of Science and Discovery, and the show also went out to the Broward County (Florida) schools. We gave them a tour of the habitat and then did interviews along with answering questions. Food is always one of the questions. We eat freeze-dried camping food as the main meal. We also have microwaveable soups and meals. There are a lot of snacks too. My favorite is “Butterfingers”! I’ll have to get back on that diet when I get topside.

Yesterday was a good day. We found our old study site, and spent the morning monitoring and measuring the barrel sponges. All the while being passed by fish after fish. Even some lobster popped out to see what odd creatures were making such a racket. We are guests in their world, visitors. And someone was nice enough to build a little aquarium, where they can swim up to the window and watch us. And they do, schools of them. Come up to the window and swim away. I can see the ad now, “Come see the amazing air breathers.”

I spent the afternoon with my brittle stars. I just completed my masters degree this year studying sponge and brittle star associations. Imagine, if you’re a brittle star and you’re going to hide in a sponge, you’ll probably pick one that gives the best protection. A sponge with one big opening lets too many predators in, and would not be a good place to stay. So we set up a bunch sponges with big and small openings. How do you change the opening of a sponge? With a needle and thread of course. This morning we’ll go and see how many of these nocturnal creatures stayed in their different habitats. And another piece of the puzzle begins to fall into place.

As I said, it’s a full day, so it’s off to work. I’m thinking another bowl of oatmeal for breakfast. Then it’s out to the wet porch, and back to work. The life of an aquanaut.

We spent last week in training, reacquainting ourselves with the gear and the ideas of saturation diving. Like I said, we had all done this a year ago, but the gear isn’t our usual scuba gear. Twin aluminum air tanks, weighing about 90 pounds, lines and reels, systems of checks and double checks. Normally the surface is our safety net, but down here our bodies are saturated with gases, thus the type of diving “saturation diving.” So our metal tube, our Aquarius, is our safety net, and we’re never far from it.

It’s now Tuesday morning, and with network problems soon to be resolved, we have access to email and the Internet. So someone out there can read these random thoughts. We’re already ahead of our work schedule. Yesterday we began to monitor the giant barrel sponge Xestospongia muta. We’ve been watching the local population for a couple years now, examining growth, recruitment, die-off and disease. This mission we are continuing to look at deep water sponges, and will head to our site at 110 ft. depth this morning. Through Aquarius, we can stay out diving for over 3 hours at this depth, much longer than surface diving.

So, I should grab a bowl of oatmeal and prepare for the day. Looking out the window, the sun is shining, sky is blue, without a cloud to be seen. Well actually, the water is blue, and schools of fish are swimming about the window. Visibility could be a bit better, but hey when your get to live under the sea, who can complain. Just another day at the office.