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The highs and lows of field work! When we reached deeper waters south-west of Portland yesterday afternoon, the acoustics team deployed a couple of 'dud' sonobuoys (if, in the moments after the units go into the water, no signal is received, it is considered a non-starter and another is deployed). Thinking it wasn't likely that two sonobuoys in a row were broken, they discovered that something was amiss with their listening gear (the signal amplifier, to be more precise). This resulted in a much reduced radius of communication between the sonobuoy and the vessel. Dang. However, we didn't wish to waste the day, so we followed along a bearing of a signal the acousticians had been able to follow, and we sure are glad we did! Late afternoon we saw large blows over the horizon, just south of Cape Bridgewater; and after about 40 minutes, we came across a group of four feeding blue whales. We were treated to stunning displays of lunge feeding, amidst dive-bombing pelagic birds and patches of sea 'boiling' with small fish trying not to become prey. Eventually, some of the more experienced whale observers on our team noticed one of the feeding animals was, in fact, a fin whale. The skin colour is darker than a blue whale (blue whales tend to glow pale blue under the water); there was a larger dorsal fin, relative to its body size; it had the distinctive chevron patterning back from the rostrum; and its swimming pattern was less fluid than expected of a blue whale. We are incredibly lucky to have members of our science team that are so experienced——and very patient with us lesser mortals. Eventually, we were able to drag ourselves away from this spectacle to make our way back to port——in order to seek out the damaged components for the acoustics team——where we spent the night. Out again at 0900 this morning to return out to the deeper waters to continue testing the sonobuoys and to deploy the acoustic mooring.
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.