OBS in PNW Day 5

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Day 5.
By the time we woke up for our next watch, excitement, albeit negative excitement, was high. Last night while on site for Jason testing, a winch test of a Trawl Resistant Mount (essentially a hood that covers the OBS and protects it from fisherman nets) failed. The line snapped under the weight of the hood for reasons unknown and the hood was lost overboard. Thankfully we can put our faith in the capable robotic hands of Jason to save the day. A plan was implemented to deploy Jason down to the bottom of approximately 950 meters of water to search for our renegade TRM.
Needless to say, John and I were pumped that Jason was about to spring into action on our watch because that means we were headed to the control room (photo 006)! It took some time for preparations, and it took more time to finally get to the bottom, but once we were there, the Jason control van was squared away and on point. After passing by shrimp, octopus, a school of anchovies and fish, we found our wayward TRM (photo ??). We put a fix on it, went back to the surface to load Jason up with some tools, and back down to put a hook on it. Of course all of this took time and our watch expired by the time the TRM was fully retrieved, but the jubilance was had when the cameras eyes were feasting on the upturned TRM, and we were there with our fork and knife.
In all fairness, Hanna and Astrika’s watch when we were relieved must have been really interesting as well. Being able to see the human-like dexterity of Jason operating nearly 1000 meters beneath the surface was surely exciting. The ability to attach a clamp and line to the side of the TRM with robotic hands and arms is pretty amazing. Later on their watch and into Natsumi and Caitlin’s watch, Jason and Madea were retrieved and we continued about our business.
The downside of all this is the boat remaining stationary for so long. Because we needed to hover directly over one specific spot, and ships not at anchor don’t typically like to do that in 6 foot swells, that meant heavy use of the bow thrusters which just so happen to be outboard of my stateroom. It was a sleepless night. When we finally resumed our underway, however, I was rewarded with siting my first really cool pair of marine mammals. We just so happened to be close enough to the shoreline to have cell service, so I was out on deck just hanging up from a call when I spotted two orcas off the port beam. VERY cool. That was enough for me to call it a day.

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