March 13, 2012 Exhaustion and Jellies

Today was the day when we realized we were all tired and exhausted.  I arrived at the lab at 6:30 and was surprised to see that I was the first one there.  Normally everyone is already there and preparing for the day, but today everyone got a little extra sleep which was really needed.

Yesterday we installed two wave and current sensors, which involves lifting 150 pounds of gear down to the sea floor and then making sure everything is adjusted correctly.  On the second sensor we anchored where the water was a little too shallow so we had to walk/run/swim the instrument (did I mention it weighed 150 pounds) about 100 feet to deeper water.  It was fun because I had never done that before, but it was a lot of work.  We also installed the optical instrument that we were using earlier in the trip on a pole at the same location.

Today, a group of people went up to jelly fish lake to run the REMUS while another group of us went to collect pressure sensors around the southern tip of Palau, at Peleliu, which was a major battle site during World War II.  We got in 2 beatiful dives and saw lots of sharks and amazing fish along a 200 foot shear cliff.

Enjoy the pictures.