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> July 19, 2006 - Anchors Aweigh! (part 2), Who will be the first to get sea sick? Not me!
Misty_Nikula_Ohlsen
post Jul 27 2006, 10:04 PM
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July 19, 2006 - Anchors Aweigh!
Who will be the first to get sea sick? Not me!

Wednesday, 19 July – Aboard the Gipanis, headed toward Kuril Islands
This morning we woke to cloudy skies and chilly weather. Most people had still good appetites at breakfast – we had Russian hot dogs, hard boiled eggs and bread. There was also a spread made from onions, garlic and eggplant – like a Russian Baba Ganoush. Very tasty on the bread and with the eggs.

After breakfast, we had our first group meeting. We talked about safety aboard the ship and on the islands. There are scheduled phone call times for each shore group to contact the ship by satellite phone or VHF radio so that we can be sure that everyone is doing well. There was also discussion of following safety precautions such as always traveling in a group, ensuring that you are back at the scheduled meeting times because if you are not there within 30 minutes a search party will be sent out and how to deal with bears. Turns out that on the northernmost and southernmost islands there are known to be bears. When we are working in these areas, we will carry bear flares (like Roman candle fireworks) and operate in groups no smaller than 4.

We also learned that meal times on the ship are 7:30 am, 11:30 am and 7:30 pm. (The large gap between dinner and supper will require planning ahead and many Zone bars and hot tea.)

Before we left the dining room, we sang “Happy Birthday” to Dena. Jody, Bre and Beth gave her some gifts that they brought from Japan as well.

Later in the day (about 2:30 pm) we had a science meeting (with birthday cake for Dena!). Ben made some introductory remarks about the project and everyone introduced themselves. The introductions were made in Russian or English and then translated, so it took some time. About 1/3 of the group is American, there are 3 Japanese scientists and the rest are Russian.

The basic cruise plan is to go to Ketoy, in the central Kurils and drop off a group of Russian volcanologists that we will pick up about 2 weeks later. Then we will head south to Urup, where we will drop off the palynologist (pollen scientist) group and part of the geology group. They will stay there for about a week to ten days while the ship continues south toward Iturup and Kanashir. We will go around both the Okhotsk and Pacific sides of these islands, which are sparsely inhabited. For the geology/tsunami research, we need to be on the Pacific side. For the archaeology research, we can be on either side.

After we return to Urup and pick up the palynologists, we will continue heading north through the Central Kurils and toward the Northern Kurils, conducting geology and archaeology research and picking up and dropping off volcanologist and palynologist groups as we go.

I will probably begin working with the geology group (digging trenches several feet deep looking for tsunami and volcanic eruption evidence) for the first 7-10 days, then with the archaeologists (digging test pits and quick excavations) and finally with the palynologists (doing coring of lake sediments to look at the pollen over the past).

Talk to you soon from the Kuril Islands!
Mrs. N-O
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