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June 23, 2006
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July 30,
2004
by Jack Irion
This update was written by Jack
Irion, PhD, who is Chief of the Social Sciences Unit of the Minerals
management Service. Dr. Irion’s role during the mission is to serve as
the Contracting Officer’s Technical Representative (COTR), the person
who ensures the purposes and contracted responsibilities of the overall
mission are fulfilled. |
The last couple of days have been fairly typical of the start of a
project of this size: lots of frenzied activity followed by long periods
of waiting for something to happen. Starting with the arrival of the
scientific crew on Wednesday afternoon in the southern Louisiana town of
Port Fourchon, the first day and a half were occupied with unpacking,
getting all the gear sorted out, and testing all the electronic
equipment to make sure it all worked before we headed out to sea.
Naturally, a few problems were found that took a while to fix. There
were little annoyances, like not having the right number of pins on an
electronic cable, and big ones like having a camera burn out on the
remotely operated vehicle (ROV) when power was put to it. These are
things that can all be remedied at the dock, but can be devastating when
out at sea. Preparation is everything for a gear-intensive expedition
like this one. We finally shoved off from the dock at 10:20 Friday
morning and arrived over the wreck of Virginia
at 3:45 that afternoon. Despite all our preparations, a few more
problems developed in the ROV camera systems. Fortunately, our
Sonsub ROV technicians are masters of
whatever wizardry it takes to make complicated machines operate under
water and we were completely up and running by 9:00 p.m. and on the
wreck site 280 feet below us. The biggest challenge on this particular
wreck is not the depth, but the fact that there is so much silt in the
water from the Mississippi River that it’s almost impossible to see
anything with our cameras from more than just a couple of feet away.
Considering the wreck itself is almost two football fields long, seeing
only two feet at a time makes it tough to do many of the tasks we have
planned. Despite the murk, we’ve seen that the wreck is home to schools
of red snapper, sea fans, and large number of long, ropey-looking
organisms called sea whips. The wreck itself is in poor condition.
This ship was hauling thousands of gallons of gasoline when she was hit
by three German torpedoes in 1942 and was largely blown to bits. So
far, it’s been difficult to find anything that we can clearly point to
and say “this is definitely from the wreck of the Virginia,” but
we still have several more hours before we have to leave this site.
Jack Irion aboard HOS Dominator.
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