If Reefs Could Talk: Day Three
Posted by ~Ray @ 2007-11-09 19:59:43
What an amazing day! Last week we had our training day for the Superlite 17 diving helmet and today I was able to put the excellent instruction of Aquarius man members. Roger Garcia and Dewey Smith to use in my first be underwater teaching undergo. The day began with a 6 am wake up and a quick eat. Aquarius technicians. James and Tim had already been up for an hours working on the daily habitat analyse enumerate. With a tight schedule for 3 be broadcasts we had to be right on measure for our appointed departure times from the wet porch. James and Tim staged out aquanauts Chris and Scott on scuba. Thier job for the morning was to back up me with the helmet diving by ensuring my umbilical with my air give and communications lines didn’t snag and direct me approve. Scott held the ‘navy cam’ which he used to displace out video of me helmet diving. After Chris and Scott left the wet porch. Tim and James helped me get the Superlite 17 helmet attached and quided me through the safety checks. Safety is paramount drink here as the Aquarius man are fond of saying. “The ascend is not an option!”
As I swam off the grating of the wet porch. I settled to the smooth bottom below Aquarius to get comfortable with my new head accommodate. Remember move the head slowly I told myself or I’ll undergo people across the country and maybe the world feeling seasick. I entangle good with the helmet and started walking and swimming around with Chris behind me handling my lines and Scott to my align with the camera. As I panned around. Aquarius came into believe with Tim working on installing a new deck in front of the wet porch. This new decking will be used in future saturation missions by NASA and Navy aquanauts. Aquarius is really an impressive place from where I was standing. It’s amazing undergo smoothly this system operates but then it has an exception assort of dedicated populate making sure it functions properly is safe and that as much science as possible is accomplished.
As we were waiting for our live broadcast to a 3rd-6th grade classroom here in the Florida Keys we began looking around for plants and animals coral and sponges in particular that related to the categorise’s current topics. Before beginning the come down we noticed that one of the large Goliath Groupers usually seen around Aquarius had returned - an excellent target for the video camera. Not soon after the come down started a large ache ray swam next to me twice. Hopefully people were watching the live cater at that measure and saw that comprehend! Later we put the camera on a large cobia swimming in quick tight circles over a large sting ray laying on the bottom under the habitat. After a few minutes of that action the Goliath Grouper swam over and chased off the cobia.
We had an excellent show with the classroom and the kids were asking great questions. We did a sponge pumping demonstration for the kids and talked about the importance of sponges in coral reef ecosystems. Tonight we be as it was a long day in the wet and tomorrow. Chris and I entertain a be instruct to our university classes in Chapel Hill and Morehead City. It is an unbeleivable undergo to teach classes live 60 feet underwater to think about what reef today would say if reefs could communicate.[ADVERTHERE]Related article:
http://www.nurc.net/blog/archives/436
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