Mike Castellini in Antarctica

Cruise Report

February 5, 2000
Antarctica

We are now only a few days away from the end of our cruise and this is being met with mixed feelings. On the one hand, we can't believe that it is time to quit and we all keep thinking of new and exciting work we would like to do. On the other hand, we are all very tired and starting to think of going home to our families and friends. We will pass through 75 south tonight as we cruise southward towards our last few stations and are at about 156 degrees west.
Today was also just about at the limits of our sense of adventure. We have had very bad weather for the last 48 hours and the high winds continued through the day, though the snow had stopped. The winds have been holding at about 30 kts and with the temperature outside below freezing, the wind chill brought it down to about -30 C. This is not too bad under most conditions, except that we did lots of boat operations today and were getting soaking wet in the Zodiacs. The combination of wet, cold and wind was tough.
The morning started out with us finding a crabeater seal on a flow where we could easily reach it by walking off the ship. We got all dressed and out onto the bow, only to see the animal crawl away into the water. So, we went back down, got undressed and started another search. We then found a Ross seal very far away on a different flow and this time went after it in a Zodiac. It was about 2 miles away and by the time we got there, we had been soaked from the spray from the boat. To make matters worse, the wind was so bad that we could not land our raft on the ice flow. This is the first time that I think this has happened on this cruise. So, back, once again, to the boat to get into warm and dry clothes. We then heard that the ship would drive us to the Ross seal, so, we got dressed, again, for a third time that morning. Dressing involves all our thermal underwear, polar fleece over the top of that, a Mustang suit which is a cold weather survival suit that we wear on the outside, hats, mittens, goggles and all our survival gear. I also wear a radio under my suit with a microphone near my ear so that I can hear and talk to the boat while we are traveling. We were let down off the bow in a sling from a crane and walked to the Ross seal, about 200 meters away. It was still very cold and windy and hard to work since the electronic devices we used were getting covered in ice and blowing snow. Also, the ice was not very thick and we kept sinking into the snow and water. Imagine trying to work in a Slurpee that is 2 feet deep with a 300 pound seal and you will understand the situation. The seal was also very agile and hard to handle, but we got about 90% of the information that we needed. We hiked back to the ship, changed again and did our lab work with the samples. About an hour later, we found a Weddell seal on a small flow and stopped the ship to work on it. We wanted to walk off this time, since we were getting tired of getting wet in the Zodiacs. However, the ship cracked the ice flow when it tried to park against it, so once again, it was time to get in the water in the small boats. We were wet and cold when we landed on the flow, which was harder than usual because of the waves. But, we got to the seal who was a large female and pretty tough. She bit one of the graduate students (he is OK). We got her into a net and then she just laid on the ice upside down on her back. Since she weighed over 700 pounds and we needed to work on her back, this was a problem. However, we figured out ways to get our samples anyway.
While we were working with the seal, four emperor penguins came up onto the ice to watch us. Seeing this, the ship sent out another Zodiac with the penguin team on board. We waited on the ice flow until they showed up and then took another wet and windy ride back to the ship. Unfortunately, the waves were getting larger and larger and while the penguin team was working, the ice flow started to crack. They were not in any danger, but they did have to pick up the bird they were working on and jump over to the flow where their Zodiac was waiting! By the time they left, the flow had broken again. They got off OK though and made it back safely. As you might expect, we are pretty tired tonight and our rooms are full of wet clothing. Having freezing sea water seeping into your thermal underwear is not a pleasant feeling!
Tonight, we will tow several plankton and fish nets and then go about 50 more miles south to our very last station here in the pack ice. We expect to work there all day tomorrow (hopefully, the wind will have stopped) and then leave tomorrow night for the fast ice near the coast. The next day we will work near a penguin rookery, the day after that near a Weddell seal colony and then our cruise will be over! We will have a two day run back to McMurdo Station to arrive there on the morning of Feb. 10th. Some of the scientists leave the very next morning back home, but most of the seal handlers will stay 3-4 days in McMurdo to take some last samples there from the seals that live in the area.
This has been a fabulous cruise and we have seen things and been places that no one has seen before. We have worked with all four species of the pack ice seals (Ross, Weddell, leopard and crabeater) and with emperor penguins. We have studied more Ross seals than has ever been done before and have found the location where emperor penguins come to molt after the summer at their rookeries. We have caught new species of fish in our nets and flown over 15,000 km of helicopter flights counting seals and penguins. The divers have made the most dives ever in the pack ice and found areas both rich in krill and others totally desolate.
It is sad to leave, but in some ways our work has just begun. This is a three year project where the first year was just getting ready for the cruise, and years two and three will be spent analyzing all the data we have collected in the last month and a half. We have been blessed with mostly good weather and have had the pleasure of a talented crew. A month from now, when we are all back home in our offices doing things like answering mail and writing reports, this cruise will seem very much like a dream.

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