Florida State University : Research in Review

Day 18 - Tuesday, 09/30/08

Position: N32 47.554 W120 16.810

Morning caught us back atop Station No. 8, in about 2,700 meters. The day began well enough—our first of what we planned to be only two casts here popped the surface at 9 with a perfect load of sediment. We didn’t know it at the time, but that would be the last mud we’d see the rest of the day.

Being partially immobilized, I was unable to work my mojo on the multi-corer today. That’s the only possible explanation for why not one, but four casts in a row came up with nothing but seawater. Wow! Another record, perhaps, but in the wrong column. I had bragged too soon on the machine and our mastery of it, I guess.

Despite the best our corer brain-trust could do, by the end of the day we had no better clue of what was happening than when we started. The machine seemed to be telling us something. Was it as tired as the crew?

The plan now is to begin our last workday early, and try one more time. If we can fetch one more good set, we’ll have six for this station, matching six for No. 7. If we don’t, we’ll call it a good mission and go home.

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