My goodness today (or night, whichever way you want to look at it)
has been so very long. Sleep has been very hard to come by - after my
shift finished yesterday, I went to bed (after blogging for you
lovely people of course) and woke up at the ridiculous time of 6.40,
which gave me about 4 hours sleep in total. I tossed and turned for
another hour or so, finally gave up and read my book, then getting
bored of that, I went to help out in the lab, 4 hours earlier than me
shift - I'm sure a team player.
After 4 hours or so, I started to feel a bit rough, and realised that
I hadn't taken my sea sickness tablet. I was told that a quick way to
feel a bit better was to lie on the floor, so that's exactly what I
did - well me and Adam, another guy in the lab. We stopped what we
were doing, and just layed in the middle of the lab on the floor. We
must have looked like complete idiots (luckily nobody walked in), but
surprisingly, it did make me feel a bit better.
The tasks for today (and the next 4 weeks) was much the same as every
other day. We wait for the CTD to come in, go and collect all our
samples from the niskin, I analyse the pH samples whilst Adam tests
the alkalinity and total CO2, and then the next CTD comes in. At the
moment, this is probably once every 4 hours or so. Luckily, the ocean
is pretty deep here (>2km), so it takes a long time for the CTD to
descend and ascend whilst taking the water samples. This gives us a
bit of time to catch up on the analyses as the sample taking itself
takes about an hour.
Today has been perhaps the best weather day that I have had since
leaving Sydney. This is pretty unbelievable considering the Southern
Ocean (where I am), is renowned for being especially rough and
stormy. Well today wasn't one of those days, so when my shift ended,
I went up to the heli-deck (where the heli-pad is - we have no
helicopter on this voyage), and had a lil bit of a sun bathe whilst
taking a few snaps. Good times - I didn't stay out for long as I
could tell I was burning: the ozone hole is pretty big down this way
after all. With all this sunshine, the ocean was a beautiful deep
turquoise colour - extremely beautiful but with nothing else in
sight, strangely eery!
No wildlife to report as of yet - well a few birds, probably sea gulls
Current lat = -46.1735
Current lon = 145.4800
Current air temp = 11.2 (getting colder)
Current ocean temp = 11.09
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