Monday 20 February 2012

Approaching Western Channel

The day shift today only had a small amount of sampling and survey to do before we were finished at South of Celtic Deep.  We finished that location at 14:00 and have been on passage since.  We travelled south between the Isles of Scilly and Cornwall through the 'traffic separation zone'  and are now approaching the next site: 'Western Channel'.

Large Western Channel site with SE Falmouth site to the north of it
There was a moment of excitement when we rounded the tip of Cornwall because we briefly came with range of a mobile phone signal.  It was very weak and there was only time to send of a few texts before it was gone again.  Still, better than nothing and cheaper than the satellite phone at $2 per minute!

Our route to between Isles of Scilly and Cornwall, to Western Channel


Looks like we might have time for a few samples before handing over to the night shift.  They'll be busy as there are over 60 stations at Western Channel - Hamon Grab (+ HamCam) at each one, camera sledge at every third one, plus some additional camera sledge lines to investigate some particular seabed features highlighted by backscatter analysis carried out by British Geological Survey (BGS).  There's a few days work here, so plenty to share between the shifts.