No. 17 - Fishing Machine
I arrived at the pier in the windy port on the Strait of Magellan just
as the ship was landing. It was a Russian ship that we chartered to
help us conduct our annual checkup of the South Shetland Islands. The
surveys were complete, the field camps were closed, the labs were
packed, the data were backed-up and stuffed into briefcases, and a
bunch of pent-up people, weary from months in the field, were ready to
rock and roll. I had been aboard a month earlier and had come back to
take the ship out for a survey of bottom fishes. We had tons of gear
to move off and on, and many serious things to talk about, before the
ship departed again. But for now I was obliged to share in their
celebrations. We partied all night and only blinked for dawn.
Over the next several days, the ship was transformed into a fishing
machine with all of the winches, cables, reels, gantries and blocks
required to drag a net, big enough to engulf the ship itself, a mile
behind and a thousand feet below. We have many other sensors,
including more underwater acoustics and video cameras, but the big gun
in our arsenal is the bottom trawl.
Last night we were 1/3 of the way across Drake's Passage when our
progress slowed and then stopped. Westerly swells from a distant
weather system came at our starboard side and gradually built to
enormous size. In a short period of time the ship's rolls became so
extreme that the Captain was forced to turn into the weather and
reduce speed to slow ahead. By late morning things had settled down
enough to come back to the left and increase speed. We're now going
down swell but we must tack back and forth in order to get to Elephant
Island where we'll begin the survey.
But this isn't so bad. It gives us more time to get accustomed to the
movement of the ship, to get our equipment set up and tested, and to
get acquainted with each other. The grind will come soon enough.
-Roger