Coast Guard Cutter Healy to Deploy

Story from online website, military.com about the USCGC Healy deploying to the Arctic.

During the deployment, Healy will travel more than 25,000 miles and conduct more than 2,000 individual science evolutions in the course of completing seven separate science missions. Healy will spend six weeks between the second and third missions in Seattle conducting scheduled maintenance and training.

Healy's two science missions this spring are part of the National Science Foundation's Bering Ecosystem Study (BEST) and the North Pacific Research Board's Bering Sea Integrated Ecosystem Research Program. They are timed to study ecological processes as sea ice retreats through the Bering Sea. The recent decline in the extent and duration of arctic sea ice has stimulated scientific as well as public interest in how the productive Bering Sea ecosystem will change if current warming trends continue. Healy scientists will launch a comprehensive suite of studies to provide insights about how marine microorganisms, plants and animals, fish, marine mammals and birds will be affected by the ongoing changes in the region. The two chief scientists coordinating the scientific missions explain that this work at the ice edge will use different sampling strategies, but will focus on a common goal of improving ecological understanding of the Bering Sea.