Day 31 Thursday October 27, 2011

The seas are settling down again after yesterday's trek through a storm system that left a lot of people a little green around the edges.  We were met with a nice sunny day and a few surprise critter visitors, including a sea turtle.

We have started moving north now, as well, along our station track which means Rio is not too far away.  Everyone is getting antsy to see land but work is still going strong.  We have about 14 more stations to go and then a transit to port.

Another group we have on board is Nutrients.  This group looks at the levels of life sustaining nutrients that can be found in the water column.  These are necessary building blocks that are the very start of the aquatic food chain.  These measurements help biologists and chemists measure any shifts of hypoxic regions, as well as expansions and contractions of barren regions in the oceans.  Another purpose for these samples is to measure the Phosphate levels to accompany DIC and DOC processing.  Since as mentioned before there is a known natural ration of Carbon to other elements, including Phospate, this sampling acts as a diagnostic and calibration for Carbon modeling.

Thanks for reading.
-Elizabeth

Our current position is:
28  57.732'S    and   43 15.189'W

Below are a few photos of: a) The sunrise this morning and b) Nutrient's sampling area