Guess What Time It Is? DEEPEND cruise time!

Hello, everyone-  Heather J here and excited to share that we are heading out on our next DEEPEND cruise and leave at midnight!  Everyone is scurrying around as the science team and crew load gear, equipment, and food onboard in preparation to leave the dock later tonight. 

This is cruise number two of our Deep Sea Benefits project with the overall goal- using monitoring to gather information that will increase our understanding of the ecological interactions of the organisms found from the surface to the midwater column.  The data we gather can be used to design restoration actions and help protect biodiversity of the entire ecosystem down to the seafloor.

We will be deploying a benthic lander (more details soon) as we near our first station.  Once there, we will be deploying our MOC10 net system, collecting eDNA data, and gathering acoustic information.  We will be posting blogs along the way so stayed tuned for more from the team!

Here are a few action shots of our progress today!

Images:  Acoustics team assembling the boom; benthic lander ready to be loaded on the ship.