UCI at sea: A scientist's diary
A seven person UC Irvine-Chapman University research team is traveling across the Pacific Ocean, taking water and air samples that will better clarify the effect that certain chemicals, such as methyl bromide, have on the ozone layer. The team is being led by UCI researcher Eric Saltzman, who is sending periodic reports to the Orange County Register from the research vessel Wecoma.
Latest dispatch: May 26, 2004
We're still steaming southeast towards the equator. The engineers on the Wecoma managed to bootleg a motor to get our evaporator going so the ship is making freshwater again. That's a good thing, because the spare parts from the States didn't make it to Ponape. We're still taking sea showers, and not doing laundry. Our new plan is to charge on eastward and pick them up at Christmas Island. I've always wanted to go there, because it's a great place for atmospheric chemistry measurements.
Our scientific activities are just starting to produce results. We can detect a wide range of gases in the surface ocean and air, and we're able to measure the rate at which gases transfer across the surface. These gases include halocarbon gases which can affect stratospheric ozone, and sulfur gases which make aerosols and affect clouds over the oceans. We even think we've detected chlorine - C12, the same chemical in swimming pools - at very low levels in marine air. If this proves to be real, it's an exciting finding. It has been suspected that chlorine is present in marine air for some time, but these would be the first open ocean measurements. Chlorine in marine air is most likely formed from reactions on or in seasalt aerosols, but we don't know exactly how yet.
Dispatch: May 24, 2004
We are now at 9'31" N, 155'00" E, steaming southeast from Guam at about 7 knots. We're heading towards the Intertropical Convergence Zone where air from the N and S Hemispheres meets. The weather is classic northeast trade winds, with scattered cumulus clouds, occasional rain, and gentle swell. Our scientific equipment is beginning to function - still problems here and there with some of the more delicate sensors. The major problem is that the evaporator which makes fresh water has broken, and we are running out of water. We're going to divert to Ponape, Micronesia where a replacement pump from the states is being shipped to meet us. In the meantime it's restricted water use - no laundry, sea showers every other day. Fortunately the toilets flush with seawater!
Dispatch: May 21, 2004
We have been working on the ship here in Guam for about a week, installing and testing our scientific equipment. It's 87 degrees, sunny, and very humid. We have quite a large payload - so large that the ship's crane couldn't hoist it aboard - a total of 27,000 lbs. Setting up is one of the hardest parts of scientific cruises, because the delicate equipment doesn't always fare well during shipping.
We are 10 scientists and 13 crew, stuffed into a 185 foot ship, so it feels a bit like a beehive. After a whole week of setup, most of our gear is working and we are ready to get going. We'll leave tonight at 8 p.m. (for you, that's 2 a.m.). We have some very experienced oceanographers and three young scientists who have never been to sea. Christa Marandino, a graduate student a UCI, is on her first cruise. She says "I'm really excited, but I'm also scared that I'll get seasick and my equipment will fail." The first few days are the hardest - almost everyone gets a little sick at first.