Meet the Team! Science Officer David Martinson

Let's meet more of the ship team - Science Officer David!

WHERE HAS THIS JOB TAKEN YOU?
I had traveled the world extensively in my 30-some years of being in offshore seismic exploration, and many of them were (and still are) not places you really want to visit. During my time with Lamont I have toured the Pacific ring of fire, Pago Pago, Tonga, Fiji, Taiwan, the Aleutians, Pacific Northwest, Mexico, Costa Rica, Peru, Chile, and New Zealand. On the Atlantic side there is the Atlantic seaboard, Bermuda, the Azores, Spain, Iceland, the Mediterranean, the mid-Atlantic ridge, the Cape Verde Islands, and the South Atlantic. If you are willing to embrace different cultures, nearly every place will become a favorite. I still find new favorites and look forward to return visits to old favorites.

WHAT ARE THE PERKS OF THE JOB?
I think most people would think the travel to seemingly exotic destinations would be the biggest perk, but to me it is not. The shared experience with the new people you meet on every cruise, along with the underlying excitement about discovering, understanding, seeing, and participating in something new is the biggest perk.

ARE THERE ANY CHALLENGES WITH THIS JOB?
On the technical support side, this is a very challenging line of work. It requires constant attention to detail, oft-times working with limited or no spare parts. A fixed time frame in which to accomplish the primary goals despite every negative influence or breakdown encountered is probably the most difficult. One has to plan outside the box routinely and be able to readily implement (at times) an untried alternative.

HOW DID YOU GET INTO THIS JOB?
I have worked in the seismic exploration field since the 1980s. In 2006 I was working as a Project Manager for NCS Subsea on a project offshore Gabon, West Africa. I was asked by my boss (the VP of NCS) if I would be interested in doing some “gratis” consulting work for Columbia University. I said “yes”, and was put in touch with Dr. John Diebold, the chief scientist at the Lamont Doherty Earth Observatory. I worked with him via email on the design particulars of a 3D seismic survey. Through John Diebold I learned that Columbia had purchased a former Western Geophysical seismic ship and was doing a conversion to adapt it to have some ability for general purpose oceanographic research. I had worked for Western Geophysical for many years and was actively involved in the six ship building program in Ulsteinvick, Norway where the Western Legend (now Marcus G. Langseth) was built. I had also spent a lot of time on the Western Pride, which is the sister ship to the Langseth. While in Houston once for business, I was invited to see the Langseth (still under conversion) in Galveston. I traveled to Galveston, visited the Langseth, and ended up staying a couple of weeks to help get it rigged up for sea trials that were scheduled in January 2008. I ended up working assisting with the sea trials, and then was asked to help out on a cruise a month or so later. Pretty soon I was asked to be on every cruise. Through scientists and people from the NSF that I had met, I was encouraged to apply for a position at Columbia. I did and was accepted immediately. I had the best wishes for success from my previous employer, which is always a good thing to have. 

HOW DO YOU SPEND TIME OFF OF THE SHIP?
When I am off the Langseth, I do try to spend as much time at home with family as I can. Being absent for an extended period of time tends to make home tasks pile up. I also spend a fair amount of time at the Lamont Doherty Earth Observatory taking care of other related Langseth duties.

24 hours through the eyes of The Night Crew!

Making sure that a marine science operation runs continuously 24 hours a day requires a small team prepared to flip their usual day schedule around!

By Massimo Bellucci

Welcome to The Night Crew  It's 02:00 in the middle of the ocean, and our seismic and science team are being fuelled by Sour Patch Kids and Cribbage.

So what does 24 hours look like for a night-dwelling science party member?

04:40 - Sam tells me: “Hey Massimo, why don’t you write a blog post on your 24hr day?”. Not enough time to think about my day... and Victoire and Matt arrive for the change shift, it’s 05:00. Time for two words, but then I go straight to sleep.

Usually, I wake up at 12:00, or at least I try, to enjoy the sun by reading a book outside. I take a coffee (the first of many), I meet Sam, who has lunch (actually his “breakfast”), Gilles with a cup of tea, and I get on the bridge deck. Here, I know that I might meet Alistair with his book. Not every day, it depends on the wind direction. The ship’s exhaust can be annoying. It’s nice to find the same people at the same time doing the same things, like when you say good morning to the postman every day. Here is quite different, as you might understand.

My shift starts at 14:00, I go down to the lab and the three hours pass quickly. If you are bored there is a competition for anything, from cribbage to ping-pong or the questions of the day (like the country that won the last table tennis Olympics. Yes, we are addicted to ping-pong!). I have noticed that people take challenges seriously around here. The main task during our shift is to check the acquisition of multibeam and chirp. Furthermore, in case of need, we give support to the doodlebugger team (see Shaun’s post) in deck operations. Usually we only help them with streamers and birds; I don’t think there are “gunners” born between us, except for Shelby and Brian, they actually are, but they don’t know it. In those cases, we are outside, in the middle of the night, sunrise approaching, taking care of “our” beloved birds and there is no better place to be.

When everything it’s apparently quiet, we try to take advantage of the PI’s experience and all the processing software available in the four computer workstations. Personally, I am spending time using seismic processing and interpretation software, which are useful for my thesis project. But it’s interesting to spend time with members of science crew working on topics other than yours,such as geochemistry. There is a lot to learn in the ship and every moment is useful.

17:00 is workout time at the gym. The ambience is cosy. Adrien throws the glove for the challenge on the row-machine but the real task is to run on the treadmill without hands, it is more dangerous than the wingsuit. I have only seen the captain make it...

Shower and dinner, which is actually my lunch. Yes, dinner at 18:15. It is late and only leftovers remain, the kitchen closes at 18:00. We have discovered that English people are not disturbed by this time, but it’s crazy for an Italian!! From 19:00 I take free time, which means... relax. I take a nap, I read a book, make public relations, games, everything that relaxes your brain. Around 21:00 there is the attempt to sight the sunset, but here we are quite north; the weather is not always mild. There is the possibility to watch a movie: the room is fantastic, the sofas comfortable, quality of the system excellent, a wide selection of films / TV series, popcorn available in the mess but a constant background noise (similar to a lawnmower) does not allow you to fully appreciate Ennio Morricone’s soundtracks. Sad!

At about 22:00 I go down to the laboratory again. Around 23:50 Sam launches the call to arms for “midnight meal”, which is actually our dinner. The best meal for me. The environment is familiar, without line and we also stay 50 minutes sitting, with spicy coffee and fried chicken. We all go back together in the laboratory and this is our most productive time... at 01:00!! I’m trying to work on my project, and by 02:00, Shelby shows up, which means our shift starts again until 05:00. I note that she has just woken up(!) and that her morning begins even though we’re on the same “shift cycle”. It's amazing how the ship is a 24h non-stop. There is no specific scheduled time to relax, to work, to sleep or to deploy streamers.

The arrival of Steffen at 04:00 is the signal that only one hour is left at the end of the shift and his morning freshness allows us to survive until 05:00. They look like the 24 hours of a classic winter Monday, but the small details during your day that make this a special place. And there is no place so far from the routine as a research ship, especially working in the night shift.... 

Meet the Team! PSO Alejandra Ramos

One of the critical teams on a seismic expedition are the Protected Species Observers who monitor the marine mammals and wildlife around the ship to mitigate their disturbance from acoustic activity. So let's meet PSO Alejandra Ramos from Mérida, México!

HOW DID YOU GET INTO THIS JOB?
A dear friend of mine told me that her company was recruiting people, and she suggested that I could do a good job as a PSO. I sent an application and they called me for an interview. Apparently everything went well because here I am, in the middle of the sea!

WHAT IS A USUAL DAY LIKE AT SEA?
Visual watch has to be conducted 30 minutes before the sunrise until 30 minutes after the sunset. You have to collect data such as weather conditions, visibility, wildlife sightings, and seismic operations every hour, and of course you have to keep an eye on the sea, looking for marine mammals or any other protected species (birds and turtles).

DO YOU HAVE A FAVORITE PLACE THAT YOU HAVE VISITED AT SEA?
I am really new in this business (6 months), I only have been in the North Gulf of Mexico and now here in the North Pacific, which I think is my favorite place so far.

IS THERE A PARTICULAR SPECIES YOU LOVE TO MONITOR?
So far, blue whales are my favorite.

DO YOU HAVE AN INTERESTING WILDLIFE FACT TO SHARE?
The blue whale is not only the biggest animal on Earth nowadays, it is the largest animal ever known to have lived on Earth! They can live up to 100 years!

WHY IS THIS JOB IMPORTANT TO YOU?
I believe it is important because, that way, universities and oil companies can perform seismic surveys at the sea without harming species that are sensitive to those operations. Above all, we should keep the planet safe.

What do all of these screens actually mean?!

If you are wondering what we are doing during our shifts (2x 3 hours per day) it can be summarized in one sentence: “We are watching to see if computers are computing well” (Brian, 2019 com. perso. ). 

By Axelle Cap

What can they all possibly mean?!

In fact there are many screens (46!!) grouped on an entire screen wall located in the lower part of the boat under the air gun deck, and we check if the acquisition is working well. Three teams can be distinguished here: the navigation team, the PSOs and the student team.


So let's break it down:

We, the student team (A), are working by groups of 2 or 3 persons. Our task is to adjust the phase (depth range) of the bathymetry to capture the seafloor depth from the Chirp. The Chirp (32) provides 2D data with accurate data until 10 m depth whereas the multibeam (33/34) provides 3D data (morphology) of the seafloor. We can adjust the incident angle of the multibeam to get greater, or lower, spatial resolution. Every 30 minutes we fill an Excel sheet (35) with various information (location coordinates, depth, shot number, direction and speed of the boat, wind force and direction, wave length, gravity, sea temp, salinity) from screen 19. On screen 33 there are waves curves indicating the heave, pitch and roll of waves (with practice you can also feel it directly when you walk in the boat). Screens 2 and 17 give the navigation direction and information about the boat. Screen 31 corresponds to water temperature according to the depth (only 4°C at 2500 m!). All this information will be used to know the environmental settings at any time of seismic acquisition.

Team A: I can see the seafloor from here!

The navigation team (B) is watching if the air guns and streamers are working properly. That means that when there is a shot every 15 seconds, the streamers receive a signal. They can have up to 4 streamers (line of receivers behind by the boat) to take care of. If there is something wrong with one of them, they launch the alert and then the team start to bring back the air guns and the failing streamer. They can contact the bridge at any time to adjust the navigation plan, depending on the needs of the science party and to fill the gaps of the navigation plan. They can control the birds (modules with wings located on the streamers) depth at distance in order to adjust the depth of the streamers down to 16 meters for our cruise. It is important to keep the streamers at the correct depth otherwise they can be damaged by a too high depth (birds have also a security system in case of issue). Screen 20 (RMS window) gives information about the velocity in the water column and noise proportion in the channels. Screens 7 and 8 give an idea of seismic signal, so if you have informed eyes you can guess shape of the magma chambers or other features.

Team B: Everything looks ship shape and in the right direction

The PSO team (C) is looking for mammals from the outside tower during the day and listening to them during the night using acoustic monitoring. If mammals are communicating, their “voice” can be detected by sonar. If they are too close (less than 1 km) from the boat we have to stop to shoot to not disturb them too much. Screen 45 shows the PSO team live acoustic signals from the water column where they can distinguish the frequency, amplitude and length of an acoustic signal; different mammals produce different sounds. Screen 46 helps them to locate any sources by bearing and distance from the ship. 

Team C: Watching for whales...

Other notable screens and devices:

Did Italy score Massimo?!

• Camera screens (1/6/9/11): Almost every part of the boat has a camera, and most of the time there is nothing to watch on it, but there are 3 exceptions. (1) When operations on gear are taking place of the desk you can stake if other students are working efficiently and not resting! (2) “pongvision” is surely the most important and diverting one: you can watch a ping-pong match live like in a stadium but comfortably seated and without screams in your ears. (3) It is a long time that you are here in the basement/hold of the boat, so if you want to have an idea of the weather, you can have a look on the screens (S9).

• News screen (S5): we don’t understand most of the 16 lines of this screen with so many numbers(!) but 2 things are noticeable: (1) you know that we are not shooting (turning or fixing gear) if the 15th line is red, and (2) you can get international news in English and even in French (the French community is well represented on the boat!) on the last line, if you are patient, as the words appear slowly. Newsflashes are really randomly ordered: you can learn important international news in a sentence and the next sentence will learn you that a new mosquito has been discovered in the unknown forest of somewhere unknown in the world.

• Phone: calls from bridge to the navigation team or if the PSO see a whale from the observation tower.

• Walky-talky: communications during operations are made by radio, you won’t understand well what is said because of crackling but it seems ok for people used to.

First discussions at the map table

• The map table: It is here than you can have a look to know where we are. Normally you see a black triangle in the middle of a pack of red lines (shooted lines) and white lines (scheduled lines). Sometimes you see the triangle in middle of nowhere, we are not lost but just fixing the gears and out of the studied area. This table has also many other important roles. It is like the countertop of a pub... but without beers. It is THE place where: (1) Tom brings candies and sweeties every day (the best ones are the pistachios in my mind), (2) the “question of day” is located, and (3) for a week where the Cribbage tournament took place. Here you can see the best Cribbage player of all the pacific battling for the top spot!

Meet the Doodlebuggers! Wait... what's a Doodlebugger?!

No seismic expedition is possible without it's hard-working Doodlebuggers! One of our own doodlebuggers, Shaun, gives us the full breakdown of seismic life at sea!

By Shaun Shaver

Showing students how to keep track of the streamer deployment

The official Doodlebugger patch

Doodlebugger:
As defined in the Urban Dictionary and edited for this blog: Term for field seismic personnel. Differentiated from a roughneck by their actual coarseness... Doodlebuggers search out oil, natural gas, and other precious commodities the world around by exciting the ground with explosives, drop weights, and more often than not pieces of specialized heavy equipment called vibrators or air guns. They work in the most extreme climates, brave the most dangerous countries, and suffer some of the worst wages in the oil and gas industry. Most importantly, doodlebuggers are renowned for their ability to drink. Doodlebuggers often work in camps in the middle of nowhere, and are rarely seen in their natural environment. Easily identified by their pot bellies and lack of shaving. They tell the BEST stories.... 

Meet Shaun!

Having worked as a Doodlebugger for close to 37 years, I have a pretty good idea of what the job entails and the lifestyle that it creates. 

In reality a Doodlebugger is a hardworking man or woman in the oil and gas industry, either on land or at sea on a seismic vessel. I can’t speak too much about the “Land Crews” but normally they work longer trips in worse environments than the ocean based crews (if the weather is ok).

Marine Doodlebuggers consist of 2 departments; Seismic and Maritime. The Maritime crew; Captain, Officers, Deck Hands, Engineers and last but certainly not least the Cooks and Stewards. Their role is to keep the vessel in “ship-shape” condition and running smoothly and safely. A well fed crew is always a happier crew. One Golden Rule, Never Annoy the Cook!! 

Doodlebuggers Matt, Todd and Josh keep an eye on the deployment off the starboard stern

The seismic crew is led by the Party Chief. He/She is the most senior member and in overall charge of the seismic activity and data quality. They work closely with the on board client reps and the office to ensure that the program is completed within the specifications and delivered on time to the client. As the title would suggest, The Party Chief is also in charge of buying at least a couple of rounds when the crew is back on land. 

Holding down the Navigation Screen Fort in the main lab

The 3 other roles within the seismic crew are all unique in what their responsibilities entail. Let’s start with the Navigation Department. A.k.a. Navigators, Nava-guessers or just Nav for short. Their main job is to keep the vessel “On-Line” as it acquires seismic data. High quality data is useless if we don’t accurately and precisely record where it was collected. They do have other duties, such as survey planning with the Party Chief, processing the navigation data after each seismic line is acquired and keeping their “in-sea” equipment ready for deployment. They are very often assisted by the “gunners.” 

Chris enjoying some quality time with one of the streamers up on deck

The next role is known as the “Observers”, “Obbies” or ACQ department. They work alongside the Navigators in the Instrument Room, Recording Room or Lab as it is called on Research vessels. They are tasked at insuring that the seismic cables and recording systems are capturing the precious seismic data. They are also found on the back deck deploying or recovering the seismic cables.

Josh explains how the air guns work to our science party during the induction

Last but by far not least the Mechanic, Handling Specialist or most commonly known as, “Gunner”, rounds out the list of seismic roles. Gunners are the mechanics, engineers and the “GO TO” seismic crew for just about everyone on the vessel. One of their traits is the ability to, “Improvise, Adapt and Overcome” any mechanical obstacle. Their main role is to maintain the energy source that is being used to obtain the seismic data. They started with dynamite and moved to air guns and vibrators. Land crews still use vibrators today, but they are much larger and mounted to large “Buggies”. Nowadays the air gun is the energy source used in marine seismic. Imagine the biggest air compressor at your local home improvement store. Now, strap a dozen of those together, charge them up and release all that power at once. (WARNING: trying this at home will likely land you in the hospital, and quite possibly the on the news.) Repeat this process every fifteen seconds or so for weeks on end. Needless to say, that activity is rough on the equipment, so things break often. The gunners are also tasked with keeping all the back deck equipment in perfect working order. The list of equipment is too varied and long for this blog. Just believe me when I say they have a lot to do on a large multi-streamer vessel. One last note with regards to the Gunner, never use this job description on any visa application!!! 

If you are interested in more detail and the history of the Doodlebugger please check out these links:

https://csegrecorder.com/articles/view/understanding-a-doodlebugger

https://gscretirees.wordpress.com/2011/04/25/what-is-a-doodlebugger/