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The eDNA team’s role on the Voyage to the White Shark Café expedition is not to look for any organisms themselves, but instead to use what the organisms may have left behind to infer their presence. We collect three liter samples of seawater from different depths in the water column using the CTD rosette – a … Continued

Our time on the R/V Falkor is nearly finished, the last samples have been collected, our equipment has been washed and dried in the afternoon sun, and the pace of work on the ship has slowed. The scientists have transitioned from the busy, physical work of deploying and recovering the CTD-Rosette, MOCNESS and ring net to … Continued

I have been dreaming about this day for a long time. I arrived at the White Shark Café region – about halfway between Hawaii and California (see figure below). I have been, with my lab team and collaborators, planning this expedition for three years, and have had many a sleepless night. Taking a ship as … Continued

The ocean is full of relatively small events that happen over a short period of time. To help scientists maintain a more persistent observing presence in the ocean, we use robots called Autonomous Underwater Vehicles (AUVs) to move around the ocean in three dimensions and collect data. On this research cruise we are using 3 … Continued

Out here in the Tasman Sea, chasing the internal tide involves a lot of detective work, piecing together clues from water velocity, temperature, and density to determine where exactly the tide beam is heading.

As the old saying goes, “Where there is smoke, there is fire.” This is the approach researchers on R/V Falkor are using: searching for particles and chemical signals as tracers of plumes. The chemistry of seawater around volcanoes is different from that of the rest of the ocean. When the team runs into these differences over … Continued

Dr. Kelvin Richards, the Principal Investigator on the Mixing Up The Tropical Pacific Cruise beams with excitement at the prospect of collecting new data. For him, this cruise is a significant step forward, or east, to obtain long awaited information. After working in the western equatorial Pacific for many years, Dr. Richards is curious to see … Continued

I have been onboard R/V Falkor for a week now, and have had the opportunity to intermingle with each of the departments, learning every possible aspect of the ship.Falkor’s crew is divided into four major departments: deck, engineering, interior, and science. Each group plays a very important role in the daily life of a research vessel. However, … Continued

Today was very eventful with continued DIDSON operations, small boat operations, acoustic sampling of additional areas for pilot whale echolocation activity (a.k.a. ‘clicking’), and more photo identification of short-finned pilot whales.

Julianna and I have been sailing on Falkor for a few days now. The science team is all settled in as we make our way towards the first sampling location. The transit from Majuro will be approximately three days. As the scientist’s calibrate their instruments and prepare for arrival, the ship’s crew is all action … Continued