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First, a big thank you to our trusty DVL, Dave, for writing the sitreps over the last two days; the VL was laid out with seasickness. Thankfully, everyone now has their sealegs beneath them. We've had a bonanza of a few days south and south-east of Portland (although, deployment of the acoustic mooring has been delayed until we next venture out). The acousticians have honed their methods and are now routinely leading us to blue whales within a few hours. However, getting a sighting at the end of those acoustic tracks isn't as straight forward as was hoped, and getting photographs of the often elusive and shy animals remains a challenge. As a result, we're now thinking a dominant variable in predicting whether a whale can be sampled (i.e., photographed or biopsied) is a given animal's personality: something we could never control or predict for. Still, that's an interesting result in itself. All good things must end, and we're now heading back to the safety of port before some feral weather rolls in; we could be confined to port for 4-5 days and much gnashing of teeth will ensue! And as this sitrep is being wrapped up, details of a blue whale sighting are being announced over the UHF radios. Studying these beautiful animals is a hard job, but someone's got to do it!
REGARDS: Natalie and Dave
Map
A map showing Australia and Antarctica. The map shows the journey of one voyage that has occured in the season, with each route highlighted in a distinct colour.