RCA VISIONS 23

September 18 2023: The last dive of Leg 4 (J2-1562) surveyed the seafloor at Slope Base to locate and mark a cable for potential recovery in 2024. Jason was back onboard early this morning, and the Thompson headed back to port.  The vessel arrived at the NOAA dock of ~1500 local time. Demobilization commenced then and is expected to…

September 16-17, 2023: Jason is busy with a variety of tasks.  At Axial Seamount, the ROV dove in the International District hydrothermal vent field to collect fluid samples from the vent to be analyzed for microbes and viruses.  The Jason did a second dive collect more fluid samples at Marker 113, a diffuse flow site…

September 12-15, 2023: Leg 4 has been very busy. Jason swapped out the wire crawler vehicle at the Axial Base Deep Profiler Mooring at a water depth of 2900 meters.  CTD casts were completed to verify the instruments on the deep profiler vehicle and  a CTD was exchanged at Axial Caldera. The Thompson then transited from Axial…

September 7-11, 2023: Leg 4 started with a promising note–good weather and calm seas. Ten new VISIONS students boarded the R/V Thomas G. Thompson to have their first experiences at sea. A large part of operations during Leg 4 are focusing on recovering and redeploying cabled Deep Profiler moorings that host an instrumented vehicle, which at…

September 4-6, 2023: In spite of weather delays, the objectives of Leg 3 were accomplished. Two of the Leg 3 dives took place at International District, surrounded by hydrothermal vents and chemosynthetic animal communities. The team deployed a RAS/PPS sampler which collects fluid and DNA samples from the vents, specifically a vent known as “Tiny…

September 1-4, 2023: Leg 3 once again began with unfavorable weather. Even staying in port one extra day didn’t prevent the ship from leaving Newport in rough seas with blustery winds.  Once onsite, high winds and unpredictable swell made it hard to hold position, and too hazardous for Jason dives or even CTD casts.  Only…

August 29, 2023:  The R/V Thomas G. Thompson arrived back in Newport to end Leg 2 around 12:30 local time. The team went into high gear to offload and reload the back deck for Leg 3, which heads back out on the 31st.  The previous day was a busy one.  Jason completed a Benthic Experiment Package…

August 27, 2023: The team arrived at Southern Hydrate Ridge on schedule (~0600). During  dive J2-1536, Jason swapped out junction box MJ01B. A series of instrument swap dives occurred at the same location. The medium-powered junction box (MJ01B) the was turned successfully. Jason then went  back into the water for dive J2-1537 with a digital still…

August 26, 2023: Just as the team was about to get underway to Southern Hydrate Ridge, a call came in from the R/V Rachel Carson. One of their AUVs was drifting neutral at ~40 m water depth following a mission and couldn’t be recovered. They had attempted to send a signal to the AUV to release…