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Survival suits

All UNOLS (University-National Oceanographic Laboratory System) ships have safety briefings and drills with the science party to ensure that everyone is prepared for emergencies at sea.  This includes practicing donning immersion suits in the event that the team would have to abandon ship in the cold north Atlantic waters.  One should be able to get…

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Changing conditions

During our transit we are periodically stopping to conduct CTD casts in the Labrador Sea.  We use these casts to test components and instruments that we will be deploying on the moorings in the Irminger Sea.  We lower the CTD rosette to 3000 m depth to ensure components will work at that temperature and pressure,…

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Splicing operation

The Surface Mooring consists of a surface buoy, a seafloor anchor, and a mooring riser connecting the two. The riser is made up of numerous sections of wire rope, instrumentation frames and synthetic rope. As the team transits to the Irminger Sea Array, the mooring operations team is splicing together sections of the synthetic rope.

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Big Eyes

Pete Duley, from the National Oceanographic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA), is aboard as a marine mammal observer. As we transit up the coast of Canada towards the Irminger Sea, Pete is spending his time on deck with the “Big Eyes” binoculars scanning the ocean. So far he has seen a variety of marine life –…

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Month-long expedition

The R/V Neil Armstrong, operated by the Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution, is loaded and ready for departure for a month-long expedition that includes an eight-day transit to the Irminger Sea mooring array site off the tip of Greenland. The team will recover and deploy four moorings and three gliders over the next two and a…

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Mobilization begins

The surface mooring of the Global Irminger Sea Array was tipped and loaded onto a flatbed truck for its trip down narrow, winding roads to the dock in Woods Hole village. The operation was completed in the morning to avoid tourist traffic.  The mooring and other equipment will begin to be loaded on the R/V…

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