The Adventures of Team Aquila!: First Post!

Saturday, July 7, 2012

First Post!

#Yay!

Summer of 2012 has arrived and once again the R/V Aquila and her crew are headed north to adventure. We left Seattle the evening of July 3rd, and arrived here in Ketchikan Alaska yesterday evening, July 6th. This morning, we are officially on contract with NOAA and are departing Ketchikan at 0900 this morning. More info to come but for right now we will get started with some pictures of the trip north!

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About the current project

The Aquila is on charter with NOAA for the majority of the summer of 2012, helping to provide accurate population estimates of marine mammal species. The work is split up into two main parts, the first being a mainly visual survey of whales and porpoises. The Aquila left Seattle on the 3rd of July, surveying from Ketchikan, around Glacier Bay, and back to Ketchikan. The NOAA team said their goodbyes in Ketchikan on the 21st, then we raced back to Seattle to begin preparations for our second trip. After six hectic days in Seattle, the Aquila departed for Dutch Harbor, Alaska. As I write this, the Aquila is three days from Dutch, where we will pick up the second NOAA team. This project will involve much more labor and equipment than the first, including Big-Eye spotting scopes, AN/SSQ type 53 Sonobouys, and over 40 subsea moorings specially designed to listen for and track large marine mammals.