August 11, 2006 Options

[Steve_Stevenoski]

August 11, 2006

The long hours of the past week have finally caught up with me. I headed for bed just after midnight and awoke at 8:00. Didn't last long though. Woke with a headache probably due to dehydration, just like yesterday. Drank as much water as I could hold and lay back down, finally waking at 11:00 and feeling completely human again.

After breakfast, the 24-channel streamer was unrolled off the winch and laid out in figure eights on the port side of the fantail out of the way of the cage. On the first and second deployments of the cage, we had used the streamer, but it was not working well. With the streamer on deck, Mark checked each wire and connection in the leader, and then turned his attention to the steamer. Throughout the day he worked to isolate bad channels in the steamer and determine whether the steamer was usable again.

There are about 50 pairs of wires that have to individually be checked.
Mark was busy most of the day. Fortunately he could do most of the work in the warmth of Aftcon, because the end of the leader had been snaked from the back deck through a hole in the bulkhead, across the main lab, up the stairs, down the hall and finally into Aftcon where Mark had his electronic meters to check everything out.

At 4:30 Mark and Dale headed aft to the fantail to determine the next steps that would be taken to determine what was causing the problems with the streamer. If the problem could not be diagnosed, we would have to bring a reserve streamer out of the hold and check it out before putting it into service.

Spoke with Harm before dinner. He was pleased with the way things had been going. We were transiting to our new seismic line along the Mendelev Ridge. It would take us will into tomorrow to get there depending on the ice conditions and the speed that the ship is able to maintain. Once we arrive there, the plan is to take a core, deploy the seismic instruments on the ice and then start to deploy the air guns.

Tomorrow is inspection day. At 7:00, Mark, Steffen and I began sweeping and mopping the main lab floors. We organized the garbage for removal tomorrow and the starter on the bathrooms. By 8:00 we had things looking and smelling better.

After we were don cleaning, Steffen pressurized the number 4 gun to check for leaks. Everything looked ok, but the connector for the solenoid and the bracket that holds it to the gun were bent and cracked. Both pieces would have to be removed and a new solenoid connector would have to be spliced before we could put the cage back into service.

By late evening, Mark had checked out the leader for the streamer. It looked ok and should function. The streamer would have to be replaced with one in storage. We will not use the streamer on the next seismic line, but we will need it within a week as we head south into more open water.