Letters Home, 11/23/2015 | Santorini Seismic Experiment

Letters Home are excerpts from a father (Prof. Doug Toomey, Co-Chief Scientist) to his children back home.

Dear Ebba, Sofie, John, and Family,

I awoke this morning for my 4 AM watch to see that the 4 strings of airguns (10 guns per string) were being deployed through the aft transom. It’s an impressive amount of brute force technology mixed with individuals heaving and communicating, all with ease and familiarity of the equipment and their shipmates. The clanging of metal, thousands of pounds hitting the deck, winches whining to pull, lift, and drag the strings aftward and through the transom sluice. Men harnessed in to avoid being lost to sea, themselves also wrestling with chains, lines, and guns. There are few times in ones life when everyone pulls in the same direction. When that happens, it is special and bonds of respect and admiration are made.

We were immediately east of Amorgos as the sun rose, and now we are sailing SW toward Santorini. Dramatic, early light views of the island and cloud capped peaks. All could see the famous monastery of Hozoviotissa, hit by morning sun, a sanctuary among the cliffs and sea.

Mommy remains deeply excited and grateful. Beautiful to see and deeply moving for me. For many years I would say that the focus of my own life was living some new or evolving version of my own dreams. That continues of course, as one always has desires; and should! What I notice as I grow experienced, however, is that the rewards of helping someone else achieve their dreams are many and rich. I feel lucky to have met Emilie at sea, and to now be here again as her second.

On a less philosophical note, I have been amusing myself with a GoPro. John, you should get one!! 😉 This morning Robert Steinhaus (Chief Science Officer) attached it to a line that extends from the surface floats of the airgun stream to the guns, 12 m below. It is facing downward and taking time lapse shots every 2 seconds. It if survives the pounding of 6000 cu in of air under 2000 psi, then I should have some impressive underwater images of the guns shooting. As I am writing here the guns go off every 90 seconds. There is a BOOM-Bam, and the desk and deck jump. The guns are 75 m behind the ship, closer than usual so that we can maneuver in the caldera. When we come over the shallow sill of the caldera (24 m), the closeness of the guns combined with the shallow hard bottom will give everyone in the rack a jolt.

It’s also that time of the cruise when one gets to know their shipmates, something I particularly enjoy. Many of the technical crew on board have come from the oil patch, having run industry operations. Our Chief Science Officer (Robert Steinhaus, LDEO) used to manage multi-ship operations that spent $0.5 million per day collecting seismic data. I asked him why he came to academia, knowing that he could and did make much more money in industry. His answer is typical of many of them, that it was a stressful job and that the operations happened in only a few locations (e.g., North Sea, Gulf of Mexico, etc.). Working here has allowed him to both see more varied places and also they all enjoy the enthusiasm of the scientists and students. “We discover things” is often heard.

How nice for me to know that the three of you are there with my family! You will be enjoying a real Thanksgiving, amongst your extended family. Give my love to all, ask them what they are up to, and take some photos for me. Here are some for you.

Love, Daddy