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The last loads out to the ship in the helicopter were a little bit different last night - we had buckets of seawater with marine invertebrates in them arrive to join us on board. These have been collected by one of our round trip science programs and will now live in the ship's aquarium facility until we can get them back to the AAD.
After our amazingly good cargo day yesterday (despite not being able to use our LARCs) we all awoke keen to get into it again today. Unfortunately the weather had other ideas, and with the wind and swell both a little bit stronger than we would like we delayed the commencement of operations. After a number of meetings between personnel on the ship and shore we decided to review the situation after lunch. Within an hour the swell and wind had dropped and we returned to the anchorage, where the wind and swell picked up again. This morning can best be described by the age old Antarctic/sub Antarctic saying of "Hurry up ... and wait". At 1400 the conditions finally eased and we were able to bring LARCs out to the ship to transfer two field huts, and helicopters commenced flying shortly after. The field huts are modified plastic water tanks that were intalled on the island for the Macquarie Island Pest Eradication Program (MIPEP). We were also able to move a number of cargo loads that had been holding up our progress due to their location on the ship so we hope to now be set up for an efficient day tomorrow. The forecast for tomorrow is promising so we are looking forward to completing our inwards cargo discharge, and returning as much RTA to the ship as we can. Tonight we have started to move personnel back to the ship as the weather forecast for the remainder of the week is suggesting that our operational window is closing for quite a few days.
REGARDS: Nicki and Mike
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.