3 October 2015 Light Show

Journal

Cruise Day 56

Speed 0 knots (kts) (on station)

Course n/a

Location Southern Canada Basin, ~120 nm north of Barrow, Alaska

Depth 3484 m

GO DEEPER DISCUSSION: (see previous journal for the questions.)

Did you see that story and video? That must have been a real sight to see for the scientists and crew on board. I’ve spoken with several scientists on board who have had gear chewed on or chewed up by polar bears and arctic foxes. When they deploy gear such as meteorological stations on the tundra they have to plan on these curious and maybe even playful animals going after their instruments and cables. But I don’t think anyone was expecting polar bears to grab the cable during a CTDA research tool that is submerged in the water to measure conductivity (salinity), temperature, and depth. cast!

TODAY’S JOURNAL:

We’re enjoying a very nice Arctic Saturday with periods of sunshine and only gently rolling seas. Although it is still kind of chilly outside the Sun seems warming, even if it is only psychological. Ice formations that grew from sea spray blowing over the bow in the last storm are brilliantly glittering in the bright light and some are slowly melting, but care is still needed walking around the icy decks and ladders outside. The approach of winter is still very apparent, though, with much of the ocean around us covered in fresh ice that formed when the wind settled down (more on this tomorrow.) Another reminder of our last storm was this funny comic drawn on the inside of an aft conn window by a crew member:

Let’s Do A Cast Comic — “I think we’re good, let’s do a cast!”

We finally dialed in an fantastic conditions last night of mostly clear skies, a gibbous moon, and aurora! I knew something was up when I heard an unusual amount of foot traffic in the hallway outside my cabin a little around 11 pm. Then my roommate Neil came in to tell me that the northern lights were showing well so I suited up, grabbed my tripod and camera, and headed out. The show was pretty amazing, with rapidly changing swirls, stripes, and curtains of green light. At times thin clouds passed over, blurring the effects in an interesting way. A few times it started snowing lightly while we could see the aurora, which was also pretty neat. Here are a few of the shots from last night- they are fun to look at but perhaps don’t convey the ever-changing nature of the aurora. To get these I put my camera on a tripod and set it for 2 or 3.5 second-long exposures with the ISO at 1000. I manually focused on a distant target like the moon or a bright star, and used the timer function so I wouldn’t shake the camera by pushing the shutter. Getting sharp stars was still a challenge, though, as the ship was still lightly moving in the swell.