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Journal Entries
2004-05
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| Jump to a specific journal entry by Luke Sandro: | ||
| December 2004 | 16 27 28 29 30 31 | |
| January 2005 | 01 02 03 04 05 06 07 08 09 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 20 21 22 23 24 25 26 27 29 30 31 | |
| February 2005 | 01 | |
| Click here to access journal entries by Marianne Kaput or Giancarlo Lopez-Martinez. | ||
December 16, 2004 - Springboro, Ohio (39° N Latitude):
Ten days until we leave. I have to admit I'm a little nervous...I still have so much to do to prepare! I'm writing lesson plans for my substitute teacher, making sure she knows how to teach my classes — buying some supplies (a warm hat, waterproof boots, sunglasses) — also finding more and more teachers to put on our mailing list. I hope that a lot of teachers and students read our updates and go to our website.
The other teachers are having a going-away party for me after school today, with cake for everyone! Our plane leaves on the day after Christmas. My friends keep asking me if I'll bring them home a penguin, and I have to tell them that even if I was allowed, I don't think a penguin would fit very well in my luggage.
- Luke Sandro
December 27, 2004 - Punta Arenas, Chile (52° S Latitude):
I got on a plane yesterday at 5 pm in Cincinnati, flew to Dallas, Texas, and then took a 9-hour flight to Santiago, Chile. I slept a little bit on the plane. Also, I sat next to somebody famous. Peter Yarrow, from the folk music group Peter, Paul and Mary, who wrote and sang "Puff the Magic Dragon". Very nice guy. Then we had to go through customs, where our passports and bags were inspected.
Then, we got on another plane that flew from Santiago to Punta Arenas, Chile, near the southern tip of South America. There were about 20 people on this plane that will also be on our ship to Antarctica — some of them are scientists, others will help run the ship.
Now we're in Punta Arenas, Chile. The first thing I noticed here is that the trees and bushes are all leaning quite a bit to one side. This is because the wind is very strong, and usually blows in the same direction. It’s amazing how the environment an organism lives in really shapes how it looks.
It’s 10:00 at night and it's still light out! In the Southern Hemisphere, they have summer in the months that are winter where I live in the Northern Hemisphere — because the way the earth is tilted on its axis aims the Southern Hemisphere more directly at the sun during these months. That means the days are long here right now, and it’s pretty warm, about 60°F. As we go south, the days will get longer, but it will also get colder (even though it's summer) because we’ll be moving further away from the equator.
- Luke Sandro
December 28, 2004 - Punta Arenas, Chile:
We're getting worried. One of the chemicals we need to do our research in Antarctica hasn't arrived at the ship yet. We leave tomorrow at 8:00 pm, so if it doesn't get here by then, we may have to do without it. The chemical is called Trizol, and we need to use it to preserve and extract the RNA of the insect larvae we’re studying before we can study the genes and proteins they use to survive all the extreme conditions they live in. Without it, a big part of our research will be impossible.
We have also been able to talk by phone with the people that are living at Palmer Station right now, and they tell us that we may have another problem. A lot of what's called brash ice — floating chunks of melting Antarctic ice that can be up to two meters long — has been blown by the wind into the harbor and pushed tightly together, blocking the harbor. This isn't a problem for our ship, which is an icebreaker — but it means that once we're there, and the icebreaker is gone, we may have trouble piloting the small motorboats, called Zodiacs, out of the station's harbor to get to the islands where we want to collect the insect larvae. This could delay our research until the ice moves out.
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Before we get on the ship, they give us a big duffel bag with ECW gear — ECW stands for extreme cold weather. Some of the things in the duffel bag are: a heavy coat and snow pants, long underwear, a hat and mittens, and some really cool sunglasses. If you want to see what else was in it, look at the lesson plan called “Getting Ready to Go!” (click here). Also, before we leave Punta Arenas for good, we make sure to go to the center of town, and touch the statue’s toe for luck on our journey.
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- Luke Sandro
December 29, 2004, 9:55 pm - R.M.V. Laurence M. Gould, in the Strait of Magellan, bearing northwest:
I'm on the ship now. It's called the R.M.V. Laurence M. Gould. R.M.V. stands for Research Motor Vessel, which means this ship is used only for scientific expeditions. It’s a really big ship, 230 feet long, painted orange on the bottom and yellow on the top. It is an icebreaker, too, which means that it can make it through many types of ice without being damaged.
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The chemical we needed got here just in time! It was flown to Punta Arenas and got here at 6:00 pm today, two hours before we left.
The ship used a crane to load our luggage, and the food and supplies for our trip, onto the boat. Scott and I helped them load the fruits and vegetables this morning. All the fruits, vegetables, and other new food for the trip are called freshies, and these will be not only for us, but also for the people who are already in Antarctica at Palmer Station — they'll be glad to see fresh food!
I sleep in a big metal box on the bottom level of the ship called the berthing van. It holds 5 people, and can be moved on and off the ship when there are more people on board than will fit in the ship's normal cabins (45). There are 51 people on board now, which leaves six of us without normal cabins, which means we needed two berthing vans for the trip.
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The captain taught us today about what to do if there is an emergency on the ship. He showed us how to get to the lifeboats, and how to put on our immersion suits, which keep you warm and dry if you have to jump into the cold water. Tomorrow we're going to have something like a fire drill, where bells and alarms ring, and everyone has to grab their life jacket and immersion suits and run to the lifeboats.
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- Luke Sandro
December 30, 2004 - Strait of Magellan, almost to the Atlantic Ocean:
I woke up in the berthing van at 3:30 this morning and couldn't sleep because I was so excited about our trip. I got up and watched from the deck outside the ship as the sun rose from 4:30-5:30 am. It was really beautiful. I saw lots of different animals, too — a whole bunch of Commerson's dolphins were swimming around us — they are beautiful, colored black and white and very easy to see.
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Today I also saw a giant petrel, a cape petrel, and a storm petrel. These birds (and many other seabirds) have adapted so they can survive by drinking salt water! The way they can do this is by using special salt glands in the tops of their beaks that excrete the salt that was in the water. I have also seen some black-browed albatrosses, and a young wandering albatross, which is the biggest bird I've ever seen. The wandering albatross has wing-bones that can lock into a gliding position, and it is very good at gliding on air currents without using very much of its energy. Because of this, it is able to stay out at sea, in flight, for many months at a time without coming back to land.
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There are a lot of big, ugly floating platforms that drill for oil in this part of the Strait of Magellan. I counted 16 of them this morning.
The ship has a lounge with big, comfy chairs and a huge collection of videotapes and DVD movies to watch if we get bored. That's where I am right now, typing this on my laptop computer. The televisions on the ship can show movies, but we can also change the channel to see different camera views outside the ship, or a picture that shows where we are on the map — I like to look at that one. We also have an exercise room with a treadmill, rowing machine and weight bench, which is fun.
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We had an emergency drill today, which is like a fire drill — bells and alarms ring, and everyone has to run and grab their immersion suits and life jackets, and go to the top of the ship — this is so if there's a real emergency, everyone will know what to do. Everyone did fine.
More good news today. The people at Palmer Station say that the brash ice has moved out of the harbor, and that we should be able to use the Zodiac boats with no problem.
- Luke Sandro
New Year’s Eve Day, 2004 - about 90 nautical miles (1 N. M. = 1.2 miles) south of Cape Horn, well into the Drake Passage (57° S Latitude):
We are now in the Drake Passage, which is between South America and Antarctica. It has been famous throughout history for being one of the roughest and most difficult areas to sail across in the world. The ship is very unstable and hard to walk on right now, rolling from side to side, and pitching backward and forward. The rule when you're walking around the ship in these conditions is "one hand for yourself, one hand for the ship", which means you should always be holding onto part of the ship with a free hand. Things like serving a meal and washing yourself in the shower are very difficult. It is also getting colder, because we are moving south, away from the equator. We will be in the Drake Passage until we get to Palmer Station in Antarctica on January 2nd, 2005.
I'm in the ship's lounge, and the magazines on the table keep falling on the floor. Some people are seasick right now, which isn't fun. I'm glad I don't get seasick, but even if I did, there are medicines that can make you feel better. Here's a short video clip that helps show how much the boat is rolling side to side (click here).
While we're in the Drake Passage, scientists on the ship are using something called an XBT (expendable batho-thermograph). It releases little measuring devices called probes that record the water temperature at different depths in the water of the Drake Passage, and send the data back to a computer on the ship. Every time this ship crosses the Drake Passage, they use the XBT, and it’s been crossing several times a year for about ten years. The data collected from the XBT has helped scientists understand a lot more about climate and ocean currents, and especially the way global warming is changing the earth.
- Luke Sandro