It is day nine and the aquanauts are wrapping things up. With the help of the surface based dive team scientific instruments, personal gear, and equipment are all being packed up, brought to the surface, and brought back to shore. Inside Aquarius things are being checked, stored, and cleaned up and another habitat technician has joined the crew below to oversee decompression.
The aquanauts will begin decompression at 4:00pm. They start the process in their bunks, lying quietly and going through three, twenty-minute cycles on oxygen with five minutes in between; this helps begin flushing of excess nitrogen from their tissues. The pressure inside the habitat will be reduced during this time at a rate equivalent to six minutes per foot of depth to about 30 feet. Then, over the next 16 hours while the aquanauts rest, keep hydrated, do a little movie watching, and get some sleep the pressure will continue to be reduced at a slower rate. Tomorrow morning the habitat will be at surface pressure, before being blown back down to about 50 feet so the aquanauts can make one last dive out through the moon pool where they will be met and escorted to the surface.
Even for the experienced aquanaut, the opportunity to live underwater is one to be cherished. After nine years of working with Aquarius, Oceanographic Field Operations Manager and aquanaut, Mark Hulsbeck says of the mission, “Saturating in Aquarius is my favorite part of the job and it hasn’t gotten old yet”. And over the years as Mark describes we get to know some of the creatures that seem to hang around the Aquarius, such as “stumpy the stingray, who has a chopped off tail. Probably bitten off by a shark. The tiger tail sea cucumber slumbering in a small grotto just off the Aquarius bow – not one of the more attractive of creatures, but loyal as he has stayed put for quite a few years. And then of course there’s Bob aka a Big ‘Ol Barracuda). He’s well known among aquanauts, hangs around the habitat, and is not afraid of divers, but then with those teeth, he doesn’t have to be.”
Dr. Jim Hench says the mission looks like a great success in terms of the science; as he puts it,” I’m super stoked about the data so far. We streamed in real-time sponge pumping rates, ambient currents, and water chemistry data. It will take months to analyze all of it, but even in the raw data stream we can get a rough idea of the data quality and some of the patterns. There appear to be times when the sponge pumping shuts down, but we don’t know why yet. We monitored conditions that may help us understand this behavior. One evening Patrick and I noticed a rapid change in the water color while out on a dive. We were due back in the habitat shortly afterward and when we came in we talked with Howard and Brian and starting looking at the data stream from the mass-spec and sure enough, the dissolved oxygen content of the water flowing out of the sponge started to dip sharply. It looked like the sponges were doing something different, so we grabbed a quick drink and then went out on the 200 ft hookah line to collect water samples for later analysis. The event only lasted an hour and we were thrilled to be able to capture some data on it.”
All and all it looks like another great mission and we all look forward to welcoming our intrepid aquanauts back to land sometime tomorrow morning.
Keep those questions and comments coming and stay tuned for our next mission, training begins the week of Nov. 5th and spashdown is Nov. 12th!
Dr. Ellen Prager
Chief Scientist, Aquarius Reef Base
Our aquanauts are now beginning their seventh day living among the fish. The research is reportedly going well as they continue to take detailed measurements of how the water flows in, around, and out of sponges on the reef. Measurements of oxygen, carbon dioxide, and nitrates along with other chemical substances in the water are streaming in through the mass spectrometer and water samples continue to be collected around the clock.
While the scientists have been pursuing their studies, our expert habitat technicians have also been working hard to ensure the safety of the researchers and that all life support systems are working and on target, regularly checking in with the shore based crew, and performing maintenance tasks both inside of Aquarius and on the outside.
And in between their duties, all of the aquanauts are enjoying the spectacular scenery undersea and what life is like living in an undersea research station. After long hours and very early morning diving, rest is welcome and sleep sound. Most aquanauts say they sleep well in Aquarius – unless there is a snorer among the team, but even then sometimes tiredness overcomes the nightly noise.
Meal times in Aquarius are an important part of the day. Aquanauts that spend six to nine hours a day diving expend a lot of energy and need to refuel their bodies between dives. Meals are also a time for aquanauts to laugh over what the high pressure atmosphere can do to food containers that contain air or how things tend to taste bland. Aquanaut on this mission and Aquarius oceanographic field operations manager, Mark Hulsbeck says that his favorite food down below is cheese quesadilla’s with lots of salsa. Although he also reveals that he tends to put hot sauce on most of his food, even when living at the surface. From my missions as an aquanaut, I happen to know that chocolate still tastes particularly good down below. Hot chocolate and soup are common favorites. There is no oven or stove for safety reasons, but there is a microwave, cooler, and instant hot water maker. Most meals consist of freeze-dried foods that are reconstituted with hot water, including eggs and bacon, a variety of beef, chicken, and pasta dishes, and even deserts. And every once in a while a diver may make a special delivery to the aquanauts – such as pizza.
Stay tuned as the aquanauts wrap up their science in the next few days, prepare for decompression and the return to a landlubber existence.
Dr. Ellen Prager
Chief Scientist, Aquarius Reef Base
Well it’s the morning of Day Six and science is rolling along. We woke this morning to find that the visibility outside the habitat got worse over night. Brian went out to sample before dawn and had a green – murky swim out to our site. Interestingly, the mass spectrometer is giving us some notably different readings in conjunction with the green/new watermass, so we may be able to get a cool science story out of all this murk. Even with the lowered visibility, the outside lights on the habitat still provide a show. Last night Jim was out doing a midnight survey and came back to find the resident Goliath Groupers slurping up yellow-tails in the lights. Every day there’s a new sight to see down here – it’s a whole new reality from what you’re used to. Science wise the last few days have gone pretty smoothly, we have had a few small instrument problems, but with the help of our top-notch topside crew we got everything back up and running without losing much data. The dayboat crew is so good we even got a delivery of homemade brownies yesterday – a blessing. So a big thanks Sarah – the brownies were awesome! Daily deliveries of supplies are not needed, but they sure are appreciated as are the people who help us move the science along. It would be a completely different mission if we didn’t have the excellent support team that we do.
Patrick Gibson, aquanaut
It is day five of the mission and as Howard writes in the previous blog, the aquanauts are getting out there, unlocking the mysteries of the reef’s sponges, and in between becoming the focus of some underwater paparazzi. Along with a visit from a crew filming for the Discovery Channel, they did an interview from Aquarius with a reporter on shore from HD News and today, Telemundo will be making a brief visit to bring the excitement of the undersea lab to Spanish speakers across the globe.
And while landlubbers are getting a great view of what life is like down below from the streaming web cams and blogs, the aquanauts are enjoying the surrounding scenery as well. Lead habitat technician, Mark Hulsbeck finds the view especially interesting at night… “waking up in the middle of the night and looking out of the bunkroom viewport, you never know what you’ll see. The first night, I saw a large pink moon jellyfish undulating past the viewport – hard to tell if I was dreaming or not. In the morning I awoke to what first appeared to be a nuclear submarine blocking the viewport. Turned out it was the larger (300 lbs) of two goliath groupers that have taken up residency at Aquarius. Too cool!.”
And you never know what might happen when you are out diving…..aquanaut Patrick Gibson found this out, relaying, “I had a big green seaturtle come right up and check me out today. He also swam over to inspect my instruments, the “turtles.” He came right up to us without any fear or hesitation. Part of me thinks that with the double tanks on my back and the instruments looking the way they do that he may have thought he fit in with us. It’s refreshing to have those big animal encounters down here – it really brings things into perspective.”
All of the aquanauts are enjoying the extended time for diving that living in Aquarius allows and the unmatched view from the world’s only undersea research station.
Dr. Ellen Prager
Chief Scientist, Aquarius Reef Base
Today, the term early bird gets the worm applied. Brian and I hit the water promptly at 4:30 am in the still on the early morning. Swimming out we hoped to catch a sponge pumping event during our sampling regiment. SCORE!! After getting back with samples in hand we checked the data coming in real time from our instrument – the underwater mass spectrometer, and low and behold a perfect hit. We could see a distinct change in the chemistry of the water flowing out of the sponge – what we call a sponge pumping event. I am not sure how we could do it without Aquarius! Moving day took up the rest of our dive time. With several days of good data on one set of sponges we opted to move on to get more replicates at other sponges. In most cases we had to move the equipment less than 10 feet, but with all the probes, tripods, tubing, and realignments…….It takes longer that you might think. The day was rounded off by a visit from the host and cameraman filming for a new Discovery Channel show for kids. They were very enthusiastic and excited to see our undersea home and all the science going on. Keep your remote flipping on your television and you will come by us in a couple of months.
Sleeping with the fish,
Howard