dozens of dophins and ones of whales

well, i know i thought i had posted the last graphic for a while, but
i heard "porpoises on the port side" on the loudspeaker and i ran for
my camera. i went out on the fan tail (the stern of the main deck) and
looked to port and saw ~6 jumping in unison... did not have my camera,
but i ran around up a deck and got ready. as i was doing so, casey
(computer lab tech from UW) yelled, "look a whale." we saw a beautiful
humpback swimming alongside for a few seconds...

then i looked around and saw many many whale spouts and hundreds of
dolphins. my zoom is small on my camera, so i got ready for ones that
would swim closer to the ship.... after about 150 shots, i got a dozen
good pics. so beautiful. these are pacific white sided dolphins
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pacific_white-sided_dolphin

this is the best close up of the lot, with two looking up at me (lol).

neah bay radar

oh, here is a shot of the ships radar i took when we were in neah bay.
if you go to maps.google.com and search for neah bay washington you
will find it on the northwest tip of WA. this is where we sought safe
harbor to do the electronic repair on the ships engines...

you will notice the shape of the green radar returns match the shape
of the coastline you might find on google. very cool.

now i am about to pack my computer, so not likely to get off any more
graphic posts until i am on land again... peace and blessings, jay p

getting ready to wrap things up

i just had my last dinner aboard the tgt tonight. gonna miss this ship
and her crew. good times had by all. casey and brandi in the lab were
awesome. could not have done this without them. jackie was a great
intern, even though we could not come up with a demeaning nickname for
her. ;~).... sarah was a great steward (cook) and thanks for making me
some extra food dishes i could eat. yummm. tony and terrence were also
great in the kitchen, thanks! captain john was particularly helpful
and easy going, even when i told un-funny jokes. terry the first
engineer has a good sense of humor (as he laughed at my un-funny
jokes). dana africa was always a joy to chat with, what a great and
rich perspective she has. russel, frank, mike, mark, jay, pat, zeke,
dave, and all the other crew (sorry i do not have your names in my
head right now) were all very supportive.

we hit newport tomorrow and i leave the ship to get back to work on my
research (and to tie some loose ends that were left to tie when i left
for seattle ~2 weeks ago). it was fun. ill be posting the cruise
report web site soon here. stephen marley is in arcata on thrs.

blessings, jay p

clean and safe science

while at sea we practice safe and clean science. there is no alcohol
aboard because soemtimes people do not show up to their shift. this
sometimes leads to the discovery that they are no longer on the ship.
if you fall off the ship and nobody knows about it,,, that is the end
of your story for sure. so, a few years ago, alcohol was banned from
all UNOLS (the organization that runs the US science fleet) ships.

this is not really a problem. just thought i would share it with you all.

finall ygot sub-bottom profiler to work

after struggling with this for the entire cruise... with the
assistance of brandi (uw science tech) and knudesn techs, we have now
the correct settings (ping rate) to correctly compensate for heave
(motion of the ship up and down). this way, the software can plot the
ocean bottom flatly, if it is flat.

this image shows how the data looked before (on left) and after (on
right) we made this correction. we are quite pleased as the second
half of the cruise will collect this better-cmpensated data... woot
woot.

to give brandi, bran, and tim credit, they had, the night before,
figured out how to process the data to compensate for this. this took
many days with conversations with the person who wrote the software
they were using to do the processing (sioseis and seisee, linux and
windows, along with kingdom suite, windows). this processing will need
to be done eventually on all the data, as we are collecting the raw
unprocessed segy files... but the binary file plotted on the software
during acquisition is correct now (what the screen dump shows in this
image). thanks all.

hope these work, lol

well, i was walking around on deck the other day and noticed the
expiration date on these. the ship was constructed in 1991, but these
have been kept up to date since then. of course, if you look at the
expiration date... what caught my eye was the 2011 year, that is this
year. luckily, our cruise ends before july.

ship is trusty, but in need of repair

well, we lost propulsion last night as i was getting ready to nap
after my shift... apparently, one of the engines needs to be repaired
in some way. in order to prevent losing propulsion when we enter
newport harbor this coming sunday, we will be heading to neah bay on
mon/tues to get these repairs made. we will probably stay on the ship,
regardless of how interested we would be in an adult beverage (which
is prohibited on the ship). if this were a french ship, we would have
a glass of wine for lunch every day. good thing is that the rough seas
we are expecting (4m mean high wave height) will hit us when we are in
neah bay.

also, the multibeam had been troubling us for a while in the last day.
this was troubleshot to be related to the supply voltage. the ups
system was kicking in every now and then when the pings hit off.
brandi (super science tech from UW) and terry (head engineer) worked
this out. they simply changed the source of power for the ship. now,
the multibeam is operating within specs. so, we will not need to get
parts sent nor head for port to repair it (which was considered a
likely option earlier today).

other than all this, it has been a great monday!

here we are now

here is a shot showing where we are right now... our position is
demarcated by the symbol that looks like a crime scene murder mystery
symbol. lol

engine troubles will bring us to neah bay on tuesday,,, hopefully
avoidign the 16' seas....

turbidite heaven

this is where turbidites go when they decide to die.

there are over 35 m of turbidites in this image. the upper most dark
horizontal line is the surface return (the contrast between sediment
and water). then the brighter parts (white) are sandy and the darker
parts are muddy (generally)... i counted at least 18 turbidites in
this sequence. this would be a spectacular place to collect a deep
core to investigate earthquake history. i now count more than 18. you
can read the lat/long in red, if you want to search for this location.
the amplitude envelope is in green on the right (for the current ping,
which is not representative of the turbidites seen in the center of
the image).

the other shot is from the bow of the thompson. i risked my life to
take this shot (not really, although i could have lost my balance and
fell over the edge).

confluence test

here is a shot of the multi beam as we were collecting while roaming
above the confluence of the Cascadia and Willapa channels offshore
Washington. you can see the cahnnels are in blue and the surrounding
levee systems, which are less deep, are in yellow.

cromsos did an excellent job at laying out our waypoints so that we
could hit the confluence, which has yet to be mapped in such detail. i
suspect this bathy will end up in a powerpoint slide very soon! this
is a key part of the seismo part of the story for the turbidites. more
on this later, i need to get to bed... gotta get up early for work.

working on the ship (captain and 1st engineer)

here is a shot of our trusty captain john and first engineer terry
making some adjustments to the radar equipment (i believe). since we
are simply mapping (and not coring, which would require much more from
the ship and science crew), the ship's crew is able to attend to some
maintenance of the ship. the thompson did recently spend about 3
months in port where they rebuilt all the engines and drive motors
(z-drives). they also completely rebuilt the cranes and many other
parts of the ship as well. they actually cut holes in the sides and
deck of the ship to extract the engines and motors so they could be
rebuilt! ill try to post pics of the welded up patches soon.

first site reports

here is a sample of our draft OBS site reports. i am still doing some
edits, but these is the basics of what i am providing the group.

i have indesign set up to produce a report for each of over 150 sites.
one has bathymetry and one has backscatter in places (lighter grey
corresponds to 'harder' areas). there is a possible mud volcano just
north of the site (J58 is in the center of the map, designated by a
black dot). you can see it in the bathy and also a brighter bleb
(technical term) in the backscatter. thanks cromsos for pointing this
out. very cool.

wednesday is today, i am pretty sure

we are progressing quite successfully. we have surveyed our first OBS
(ocean bottom seismometer) site and it looks to be fine. i have
prepared an 'indesign' document that we will use to create OBS site
reports. these reports will be our way to let the others (who are
making the million dollar decisions) know of the conditions of any
potential OBS site. this will allow us to have a discussion regarding
the suitability of any of these sites. we have ~144 OBS sites and i
have prepared a sheet for each one. i also have a spreadsheet with
data to enter for each site (lat/long, our interpretation of site
suitability, alternative site locations, etc.). once we have maps and
sub-bottom profiles to place in them, we will send them out for review.

we also just passed over the second OBS site and think it is probably
not suitable for OBS deployment as it is in the center of a large
submarine channel. this channel is a place where turbidity currents
might (probably) travel following a large earthquake. if this were to
happen, the OBS could be translocated by the current and it would
either .1. make it difficult to recover because we would not be able
to locate it or .2. change how its position is, so data before and
after the movement could not be compared. there are many other aspects
that i will not cover here.

we noticed this and mr romsos and myself made a rapid decision about
where we needed to adjust our survey in order to make sure we had
enough bathymetric/sub-surface information to consider an alternate
site.

also, the Cascadia Initiative is the main reason we are at sea. so,
here is a link to the website that covers the workshop i attended
where we developed the plan to deploy these OBSs.
http://www.oceanleadership.org/2010/nsf-cascadia-initiative-workshop/

there is a final report that summarizes the workshop here:
http://www.oceanleadership.org/wp-content/uploads/2010/05/CI_Workshop-Report_Final.pdf

and finally, here are the guidelines we are using to site the OBSs:
http://www.oceanleadership.org/wp-content/uploads/2010/05/Guidelines_for_Cascadia_OBS_Deployments_v2.pdf

sunny day today

yet another beautiful day in paradise-dise

seas are ~3m peak to trough today... like 2 days ago, but i have sea
legs now, so i am not sea sick. totally sunny and a great view. we are
a little further offshore than yesterday, so i cannot see land
sticking up over the horizon anymore.

we are making great progress on mapping. yesterday we had to stop for
an hour to wait for some fishing boats to get out of the way and we
had to go back to fill some holidays (areas we did not map) because of
other fishing boats and also our pos-mv (our positioning unit that
tells the mapping/sonar system where we are) went out for a moment.
these delays added several hours to our survey.

here is a pic of me sending out an XBT. we drop this device (lead
'dart' with a copper wire attached) to measure the sound velocity
profile. the sound velocity profile varies with temperature and
salinity primarily. sound velocity is important as the timing of the
sonar pings through the water column is how we can tell where the sea
floor is and therefore how we can map the bathymetry.

bathymetry mapping

here is a shot of the software we are using to manage the sonar
mapping. basically, color designates depth. blue is deeper than red.
the blue is the Juan de Fuca channel offshore Washington. this channel
feeds turbidity currents that have been cored in the past to document
the earthquake history of earthquakes on the Cascadia subduction zone.

3.5 kHz logging example

here is an example of the 3.5 kHz CHIRP logging that we are doing here
offshore WA.

i mentioned this log in a previous post. depth is marked on the right.
i have labeled two units, a lower more sandy unit i am interpreting as
tubidites. the upper unit is either a series of muddy turbidites or
simply just mud. i suspect there are turbidites here, as i see some
faint reflections (difficult to see in this image).

this was taken in an arm of the Juan de Fuca Channel at approximately
N 47 24.5424 W 125 23.5226. the channel is colored blue in the next
image i will post.

survey area

here is a shot of some of the surveying (just a small portion) that we
are up to...

the orange lines are the areas we plan on surveying first. pink stars
are the ocean bottom seismometer draft locations. once we survey the
bathy and sub bottom, we will know how we might need to change the
locations...

oregon and ca will come next. more later,,, got a good shot of the 3.5 data...

at sea

we are under way and collecting excellent bathymetric and sub surface
data. yesterday i spent being sea sick as the seas were rough and i
usually get sick the 1st day. pam of the ship's crew provided me with
some bonine and i am now feeling much better, back to 110%!!!

ill post a pic of the bathy and 3.5 kHz screens later today to show
you what we see when we are collecting data. currently, we are
transiting across a wide channel that has a nice record of turbidites.
looks like there is a package of mud (~10m thick) overlying turbdites
of at least ~30m thickness. the mud is probably the holocene and the
turbidites probably represent the pleistocene (which had a much higher
frequency of turbidite deposition). this interpretation is not based
on any core data and is purely hypothetical! the mud package may
actually be turbidites that are muddy and have little density contrast
to show up on the subsurface data.

buddy shane is applying for the mariner position at COAS (soon to be
CEOAS, welcome geoscience buddies!). here is the link to the wecoma
page: http://www.shipops.oregonstate.edu/ops/wecoma/ and the link to
the elakha page: http://www.shipops.oregonstate.edu/ops/elakha/

here is the live web cam for the wecoma: http://webcam.oregonstate.edu/wecoma/

the wecoma does local research, as well as global research. it was
recently in hawaii. where it goes is based on the requests of
researchers and who gets it. the elakha generally stays local as it is
a much smaller boat. good luck to shane.

more later, j-j

locks

here is a shot from the locks...

heading to sea...

well, the fine shipboard engineers, led by terry, got the ship running
on their estimated schedule. we left dock before 17:30.... i awakened
from a nap at 5:44 and we were in the locks... i had 15 mins to get
dinner and the cook sarah had made me a custom mushroom risotto just
for me! she is the bomb. i am so lucky to have such a kind cook on
this cruise!

we were quite the spectacle to memorial day tourists at the locks.
many photos taken of our ship and us... and i got a few shots of them
too...

we are now in puget sound and are heading north to the strait of juan
de fuca. N47 42.8176 w 122 25.4833 is our position right now. now it
is not, lol.

we are already logging bathymetry and the res techs (computer and
technology crew from the U/W crew) are working on getting the 3.5 kHz
chirp running. it is currently not recording the heave (the ship
motion going up and down). the heave is important to remove from the
measurements to have a 'correct' bottom and depth measurement.

we expect to hit the mouth of the strait around 5 or 6am... my shift
is from 8am to 4pm, so i will begin my shift a little early to make
sure we get off on the good foot, just like james brown would say.

sailing off into the sunset~~~~

further delayed with generator

we are further delayed. instead of simply a fan hitting a fan housing
making a noise, the fan's set screws were sheared off. as the access
is rather limited around this equipment, our new departure time is
around 17:30. so, we are granted more time to plan with chris
goldfinger on the ship.

chris g is not participating in the cruise and will help us make
decisions remotely. instead, the ever able chris romsos will be the
chief scientist (or "PI") for this cruise. chris r (cromsos) is as
nervous as i would be, but i am confident that he will do a great
job!!! chris g would not have placed him as chief scientist if he did
not think that cromsos would succeed superbly.

ok, back to work waiting... cheers, jay

delayed momentarily, but heading to sea soon

we performed a compass calibration today ("spinning the compass"). as
we left dock, the engineers determined there was a problem with the
generator being used to power the z-drives. the ship uses generators
to make electricity to run the electric motor driven propellers. we
went back to dock to fix this problem, and we will be leaving soon.

we just had our safety meeting (safety first) in the main lab. the
science party is really small (six), so it was a short meeting. the
science crew was about 36 for the sumatra cruise, so there will be
plenty of personal space on this cruise.

right now, it is time for lunch.

at dock, U Washington, R/V Thomas G. Thompson

we have set up our computers and are working out the bugs (software
licenses, etc.). there are some new systems on board, so we will be
learning how to optimize these as we go along.

the old chirp was a knudsen 320B, but now we have a 3206 chirp. the
software in quite improved, so it is a little different that before.
there are also some additions to the multibeam system (for sonar
mapping of the seafloor topography, etc.).

chris romsos is the chief scientist and he is well prepared to lead us
on our journey. it looks like that after we go through the strait of
juan de fuca, we will head north to get some bathymetry etc. on the
outer shelf/upper slope offshore vancouver island. following that, we
will head south to collect vast amounts of data offshore washington,
where there is scant existing bathymetry.

ill try to get another map up to show everyone where we are... ill
post lat longs, etc. as we go. cheers, jay

leaving for Seattle in the morning.

in the morning, i leave for seattle, wa with my group from oregon
state university, college of oceanic and atmospheric sciences COAS,
active tectonics and seafloor mapping lab.

we will be mapping the sea floor topography (bathymetry) and
sub-surface (3.5 kHz CHIRP) off the coast of wa/or/ca/can. one goal is
to provide site information for the placement of ocean bottom
seismometers as part of the cascadia initiative. another goal is to
provide information for ocean observatories being designed in these
regions. an added benefit is that we will learn about vast areas that
have been previously unmapped to this detail. there are many
opportunities for discovery. my responsibilities will be to keep the
seismic equipment working and creating useful data.

look forward to regular posts, probably either stream-of-consciousness
or scientific in nature, or both. i will try to post maps of what we
are doing so you can all see what we are learning while at sea.

i also hope to rewrite a paper (on sumatra submarine
paleoseismology)and possibly begin a two new papers (on sumatra
submarine paleoseismology and terrestrial cascadia paleoseismology).

ill try to post on facebook when i update thus blog, but the internets
may occasionally be of limited bandwidth.

blessings, jay patton