July 4, 2009

7-4-09

Happy 4th of July everyone! I would like to celebrate our nation’s independence by not shooting off any fireworks. That would be a safety hazard. To make up for any lack of explosive-excitement, the ocean wave action has continued to pick up. Nothing dangerous, but certainly enough motion to make deploying the bongo nets a little more exciting. Simply carrying the nets across the deck to the deployment location was more work as you had to stop periodically to regain your balance. As the nets were lifted up into the air we all had a hold of the support lines and long dangling nets so nothing would start swinging around and get tangled or hit someone in the head. When we let go of the cod ends over the railing they blew around in the wind a bit and clunked against the side of the boat. The nets lowered slowly down into the water, which stopped them from blowing around in the wind, but caused them to bob up and down in the water slightly as the slack on the line tightened and loosened with the rocking ship.

The easy part was waiting for the nets to reach their desired water depth of 70 meters and then return to the surface. Once again we had to be very methodical securing all the loose lines and cod ends as we pulled them onto the deck. More than any other bongo tow, I was anxious to see what we had caught because of the extra effort that went into tonight’s catch. We emptied the cod ends into the cooler and sure enough, we had a decent catch of krill. It was the closest I think I’ll get to “The Deadliest Catch” type conditions. The poor blurry quality of the pictures from my camera makes the weather look even more dramatic. In reality, there were no waves falling on our heads, just some unstable footing. Rachel told me later in the day that we had analyzed 330 krill. She had done the lion’s share of the work while I merely filled the supporting role, but it was a nice result for a productive three weeks of work at sea. I had seen fireworks on just about every other 4th of July. This time the deckwork was much more exhilarating.