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Logbook
June 17, 1999

Contents:

• News from Wecoma
• Participant Perspective
• Logbook from Teacher at Sea
• Question/Answer from shore to sea

Weather has been uncommonly good, with little wind and sea, so we've accomplished a lot. Wecoma arrived Thursday evening and made two CTD casts over the new lava flow. Hydrothermal activity is still plentiful, with optical anomalies comparable to last year. Visual inspection of the filters suggests most of the particles are sulfur/biogenic, not metal sulfides. Several people have said they can smell sulfur impregnated in the mooring lines we've collected. Height of the maximum plume horizon seems to be 50-100 m less than last year, suggesting a diminishment in the heat flux.

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Not available today.

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Report #2
Day 2, Thursday 6/17/99

After a full day of cruising at 12 knots we reached the Axial Volcano (9pm). The crew and scientists moved into action. We deployed a carousel for sea-surface sampling.

The Conductivity Temperature Depth recorder (CTD) is an oceanographic sampling instrument with electronic sensors to continuosly measures salinity, temperature and depth. The rosette contains Niskin bottles that are large PVC plastic cylinders with spring loaded caps that close at both ends. As the stainless steel frame rosette is lowered, the end caps are open and water can pass through. Sharon Walker manned the control panel that triggered each bottle to close at the desired depth and take a sample. These bottles were then returned to the surface and water samples were removed for analysis.

Everyone was anxious to receive seawater samples from the plume region. The collection continues through the night.

Tomorrow we will be retrieving instruments that have been suspended from the seafloor for a year. Check back tomorrow to find out if we are able to recover these instruments...

Fair seas,
Ms. Deck

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