Hi, I am Christia Hewlett and I teach middle school science and marine biology at Sheridan Hills Christian School. I was chosen as the Teacher at Sea for the 3rd DEEPEND research cruise and I will be keeping you updated on all of our adventures.
We are underway! After a day busy day spent getting the ship ready for the trip, the ship headed out to sea a little after midnight. There was plenty to do to prep the ship yesterday. The lab equipment had to be unpacked and secured for being out on the water. The crew was busy preparing the ship for the research specific to this group of scientists. They attached the pole for the acoustic transducer which allows the scientists to help locate layers of organisms before the nets are lowered. They also had to weld on a special device to help control the MOCNESS (Multiple Opening/Closing Net & Environmental Sensing System) nets which will be lowered down to maximum depths of 1500 meters to collect the samples.
In addition, the ship’s crew had to load the ship with a tremendous amount of supplies and food to feed the seven member crew and the 16 scientists for the two weeks at sea.
Over the last two days scientists arrived and set up their work stations for the various projects. Some are studying cephalopods, some deep-sea fish, some crustaceans. Others are conducting molecular and genetic studies of organisms and some will be filtering the collected water to learn about the microbes it contains. This will be a great learning opportunity as I set out on this new adventure!
Teacher At Sea,
Christia Hewlett
For my marine biology students I wanted to share that I overheard two scientists talking today about obligate and facultative symbiosis in sponges and because of what we learned in class you should know what they were talking about. :)
Getting the Acoustic Transducer ready and attaching it to the boom on the ship.
Putting the nets on the MOCNESS.
Before picture of the lab. Unpacking the lab and getting the stations ready.