Journals 2008/2009

Jeff Lawrence
Lowrey Middle School, Tahlequah, OK

"Factors Controlling Coccolithophore Calcification in the Ocean" R/V Roger Revelle December 4, 2008 - January 2, 2009

Journal Index: December 2 - 3 - 4 - 5 - 6 - 7 - 8 - 9 - 10                 11 - 12 - 13 - 14 - 15 - 16 - 17                 18 - 19 - 20 - 21 - 22 - 23 - 24                 25 - 26 - 27 - 28 - 29 - 30 - 31 January 1 - 2

December 2, 2008
Montevideo Port Preparations for Sailing

Today was the first full day that I have spent in Montevideo and also the first day to arrive on the ship The R/V ROGER REVELLE. The weather is a little dreary and cool this morning with an outlook of cool temperatures through the middle of the week. Temperatures today are about 18°C.

Today has been a very busy day as many scientists from the U.S., England, Italy, and South Africa and several other countries have been arriving. They are stowing their gear and unpacking the many varied containers that have their scientific instruments and materials needed to conduct the experiments on this cruise. The photo below shows the main lab where many of the wet labs will be housed and conducted. There is a lot of expensive equipment that has to be set up before we set sail on Thursday and inspected to make sure it is in good working order. There are many labs hosted onboard throughout the ship.

This is the main lab where they will be using a lot of the equipment to figure out the densities of the phytoplankton.

The photo of the Styrofoam cups and heads are going to be used later in the cruise. They will be dropped at depth. The pressure of the seawater will crush them. The art on the drawn on the cups, the heads, were done by some students at Boothbay Harbor elementary schools. David Drapeau is one of the scientists aboard the ship. Dave has kids that attend Boothbay Region Elementary public schools. Later in the cruise we will post pictures on these items after they have been crushed.

Questions of the Day:

1. What is the pressure of one square meter of seawater?
2. What is a fluorometer?
3. If every 33' is another atmosphere of pressure and 1 atmosphere of pressure is 14.7 lbs./sq. inch, How much pressure is there in 100' of water? (use your laptop calculators if needed) or Google if needed.
4. Convert 18°C to Fahrenheit