Today’s blog post is from Timbo Stillinger, a volunteer on the SEAPLEX cruise. Tim is a rising senior at UC Berkley, where he is studying environmental biology.
Timbo writes:
Hey! It’s day six of our cruise and we are approaching the end of the transit out to our first intensive sampling station in the gyre. The weather has been great so far, today being the first day with any noticeable squall lines along the horizon brining some light drizzle now and then. It’s impressive how variable and visually stimulating the conditions are out here. From shore the ocean might appear as a large, desolate flat blue surface, but each day spent out here surrounded by that blue expanse you begin to notice how animated the surface really is. The landscape is constantly changing from the textured criss-cross of rolling swells slowly migrating under our hull to the pastel colors in the sky and clouds at sunrise and sunset. It really never gets old to stare out across this dynamic landscape.
My name is Timbo Stillinger and I have been working at Scripps Institution of Oceanography this summer as a research assistant and was lucky enough to stumble upon the opportunity to participate on this cruise. I will be a senior this fall at UC Berkeley, finishing up my B.S. in molecular environmental biology and minoring in conservation and resource studies. As the youngest member of the science party, and the only undergraduate on this cruise, I play the part of assisting in all the deployments and I get to dabble a bit in all of the different projects going on.
Most of the blogs have already mentioned our scientific purpose and many of the specifics of our various deployments but just as unique as the science we are conducting is the environment we live in these three
weeks. By the end of this cruise I will have spent over 70 days at sea this year on research vessels. For those of you reading this who have never been out to sea, life takes on a very different rhythm out here. You form a tight community with your shipmates and living 24/7 for weeks at a time with 30 people in an area about the size of a large house creates a unique and exciting work environment. I have never experienced any other environment of a similar nature and it really adds to the experience. No phone, no Internet, no news. Its great! I recommend that everyone give an oceanic voyage a try at some point in their life. Surprising as it might sound, even with the rigor of the scientific mission, the missed sleep, long nights, sunburns, and sweaty hands, traveling thousands of miles at less than 10 miles per hour disconnected from the “real world” is a relaxing endeavor.
Timbo Stillinger is always happy to assist in deploying the CTD around 3:30 AM in the morning.
During a 3 a.m. manta collection, SEAPLEX researchers retrieved fish
specimens along with two pieces of white plastic.
An Aug. 8 net collection on the SEAPLEX voyage included fish (myctophid [top] and flying fish [middle])and squid (bottom) mixed in with bits of plastic.
During an early morning haul on August 7, various pieces of plastic were
retrieved. The collection included an instance of a “nurdle” (raw
industrial preproduction plastic pellet) located second from the left.
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Nice hair bro. Excellent and exquisite blogging. Good to hear from you. Bring me some #1 PETE plastic.
By: Ben Stillinger on August 8, 2009
at 7:01 pm
Wow this is amazing, and I can’t wait to hear more! Timbo I am currently going into my sophmore year at uc berkeley and I would love to maybe meet with you once school starts to discuss seaplex and scripps. I am currently diving at scripps as a volunteer for reasearch. I’m glad to hear berkeley is being represented in the marine world and at sea!-gabi
By: gabrielle weiss on August 8, 2009
at 7:01 pm
Nice work team!
Wonderful to see this research being replicated.
How soon do you plan to test the plastic nurdles and bits for PCBs, DDT, and other POPs.
Larry
http://EcoDelMar.org
http://EcoDelMar.org/pcb
By: Larry Lawhorn on August 8, 2009
at 8:08 pm
That will be done well after they come back. I would image it will be 6 months plus before that data is available.
By: Alison Cawood on August 8, 2009
at 8:30 pm
Any idea what kind of actions could be put into action to work to help clean up the trash?
-CVHS Student
By: Nathan Hermanson on August 9, 2009
at 2:10 am
Lots of people have ideas, but this is going to be a very difficult problem to solve. Most of the plastic pieces are small and they cover a huge area, which makes it tricky to clean up efficiently.
By: Alison Cawood on August 9, 2009
at 8:04 pm
Was wondering. Would a fish ever mistake a small piece of plastic as food and eat it?
By: shasta daisy on August 9, 2009
at 9:04 am
It is possible. They will be doing gut content analysis of the fishes that are caught on this cruise, so maybe we will have a better idea after the SEAPLEX scientists finish analyzing their data.
By: Alison Cawood on August 9, 2009
at 8:03 pm
Is the plastic effecting our community and specie
By: Justicia on August 9, 2009
at 9:55 am
The plastic is probably impacting marine ecosystems, we just don’t know how. We don’t have enough information yet to understand how the plastics are changing the ocean environment.
By: Alison Cawood on August 9, 2009
at 8:02 pm
How many more times
your team going out back to sea when you return?
-Cvhs student
By: Adriel on August 9, 2009
at 11:44 am
We don’t know yet. It will depend on how the results of this cruise turn out and whether or not we can get funding for more cruises.
By: Alison Cawood on August 9, 2009
at 7:58 pm
Will the fishes suffer any problems because of all the plastic it’s swimming in?
-CVHS Student
By: Frida Basurto on August 9, 2009
at 2:31 pm
We don’t really know. It is possible that the fish are eating the plastic. It is also possible that the plastic changes the environment in some other way that we don’t understand yet that could be bad for the fish.
By: Alison Cawood on August 9, 2009
at 7:55 pm
Do you think there is a solution to this plastic problem, and if there is do you think the government is willing to solve it?
-Cvhs student
By: Rachel Porras on August 9, 2009
at 9:13 pm
I don’t know if this problem can be solved, or if the government will
help. From what I’ve heard, engineers think that cleaning up the plastic
would be very difficult and expensive, even if it is possible. We’ll just
have to wait and see how technology comes up with ways to address the
issue.
By: Alison Cawood on August 10, 2009
at 11:53 am
In addition to that, the gyre is located in international waters. No nation “owns” it so that means nobody is technically responsible for paying for the cleanup. So who will? This is my area of investigation.
By: Jesse Dubler on August 20, 2009
at 2:05 am
I think that this science voyage is a great idea and I hope that people notice that pollution is really affecting us and the marine animals.
What type of species have been more affected by the plastic?
CVHS student
By: Brenda Olvera on August 9, 2009
at 10:26 pm
So far, we know that some birds (especially albatross) have been impacted by the plastic debris. The SEAPLEX cruise is looking at ways that some of the other organisms in the gyre are impacted.
>
By: Alison Cawood on August 10, 2009
at 11:49 am
Do you know if this plastic problem can be solved and if it can do you think the government will do anything about it?
By: Rachel porras on August 9, 2009
at 11:30 pm
I don’t know if this problem can be solved, or if the government will help. From what I’ve heard, engineers think that cleaning up the plastic would be very difficult and expensive, even if it is possible. We’ll just have to wait and see how technology comes up with ways to address the issue.
>
By: Alison Cawood on August 10, 2009
at 11:48 am
I think that this science project of Seaplex is amazing. Personally i think that making a research like this is important and it is necessary to take care of our animals and our ocean. Good Job on what you have been doing & keep it up!(:
-CV student
By: Silvia Aguirre on August 10, 2009
at 9:15 pm
This is amazing. I think it’s very educational for the kids. So I am having my kids read the blog daily. It actually teaches them what happens when people liter. It effects our oceans and our sea animals. Keep up the good work and we will be reading.
By: Jackie on August 13, 2009
at 4:57 pm