Expedition 320T: Sea Trials Transit

Week 5 Report (22-28 February 2009)

PDF file is available for download.

28 February 2009

Operations

The ship continues its ~3000 nm long journey to Honolulu, Hawaii at full speed. Propulsion motors are working fine with added makeshift ventilation to keep temperatures down in thyrig bays and transformers. Although speed peaked at around 11 kt at the beginning of the week, we began feeling the full effect of the Northern Equatorial Current by midweek, slowing down the ship below 10 kt. Unusual strong headwinds winds, directly on the bow, of 30+ kt gusting to 40 kt, originating from a storm centered to the northeast of Hawaii, lead to an additional decrease in speed down to 6-7 kts by the end of this week. Interaction of the swell from this system with the effects of severe weather conditions far to the north off the Aleutian Islands generates large confused swells and causes jerky uncomfortable vessel motion. By progressively moving out of the Inner Tropical Convergence Zone, however, we are seeing increasing occasional sunshine throughout the days. International dateline was crossed on February 26. Cleaning and painting is underway in most areas of the ship.

Science and Analytical Systems Summary

After leaving Site U1330, the shipboard curator was busy storing all core material in the refrigerated hold deck and is now working on documentation. Scientists of the Readiness Assessment Team were evaluating the analytical and descriptive data gathered from Site U1330, which is still ongoing. The stratigraphic record recovered at Site U1330 was described as a single lithostratigraphic unit (Unit 1) that consists predominantly of light gray to white nannofossil ooze with foraminifers, locally grading to foraminifer nannofossil ooze. In general, descriptive observations and shipboard analytical results are consistent with the findings reported for Site 807 (ODP Leg 130). Results were presented to a large audience at a science meeting held on February 27. The preparation of chapters and figures for the Preliminary Report is still ongoing. Parallel to these activities, acceptance testing and pre-acceptance meetings for the few not yet accepted software and analytical systems continued throughout the week. Large progress was made with commissioning the Natural Gamma Ray Multisensor Logger and the Superconducting Cryogenic Magnetometer during this week. The new software applications for data capture and tabular and graphical display of descriptive data were accepted.

HSE Activities

USIO technicians started with end of cruise preparations and clean-up activities at the end of the week. Another life lifeboat and fire drill was conducted on Wednesday, February 25.

Transit Map