Gliders away!
Today truly felt like the start of our adventure in the Weddell Sea as the gliders were scheduled to go in the water for the first time That meant a very long day for some of us! The glider team was up at 4.00am, three hours before arriving on station to prepare the gliders for release. The gliders need a lot of tender love and care before being sent off on their mission. First we need to check that the glider can communicate with the satellites and "talk" with our computers back home. Then we put the glider through its paces running a number of tests that simulate what the glider will be required to do once it goes in the ocean, such as testing batteries, sensors and pumps. Finally the wings and rudder are attached and all the connections and screws are tightened one last time. All of this took place on the JCR's back deck surrounded by icebergs and with the occasional snow flurry.
The glider gets a check-up from Damien.
Liz, who has a lot of experience working with Seagliders, was the first to get hers in the water. We used a crane to lift the glider by its rudder up and over the side of the deck and into the water. The glider proved to be very popular with the locals. As soon as it was floating in the water it was immediately surrounded by a flock of petrels who had a good sniff around at the new toy . . . we wondered whether these birds would have ever seen that shade of bright yellow before! Next in the water was Andy's Caltech glider and despite a few stressful moments when we lost sight of it under the side of the ship it was deployed without any hitches. Finally Karen's UEA glider was released as well . . . three successful deployments in a few hours!
Liz and Andy prepare the glider for launch.
Then the real fun starts. When the gliders first go in the water they are buoyant so that they will float at the surface and stick their antenna into the air. The first time the gliders dive is a tense moment as there is nothing you can do to communicate with the glider below the surface. The first few dives are used to "trim" the glider--adjusting parameters so that the glider flies smoothly with a constant speed going down and coming back up. At first the glider will do shallow dives to 45 meters returning to the surface every 30 minutes or so . . . any tardiness on the glider's part is treated with exasperation usually reserved for teenagers missing their curfew! As the dives begin to look good, we will let the gliders dive to deeper depths---with the gliders having the ability to dive as deep as 1000 meters (about six hours). We are now flying the gliders out across the continental shelf towards the shelf break and deeper waters . . . we are excited to find out what these gliders can do!
Seaglider in the Weddell Sea
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