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Week 5: All Good Things Must Come to an End

Breezy Grenier on the USCGC Healy: Last week aboard the Healy. The science party disembarked in Unalaska and we are now enroute to Juneau. STARC is packing up for the season.

Last week we were wrapping up our science operations, this week we are wrapping up the science season. After we successfully recovered the mooring, we went into full steam back to Dutch Harbor. Within hours of wrapping up with science, the USCGC Healy was called into action and used as a refueling station for a rescue mission for one of the Coast Guard helicopters, which went late into the night. Semper Paratus, Always Ready! The hard working men and women of the Healy have definitely earned their well deserved rest after a 6+ month deployment, wrapping up 3 successful science missions in the Alaskan High Arctic.

After the science party departed in Dutch Harbor, Unalaska, it went from a busy beehive to a ghost town. The marine science technician’s office is near our work quarters, so we still see them, and we have the occasional watch stander walking thru on their rounds, but nothing like it was before. The deck team is busy with flight training operations, instead of on-deck running CTD, XCTD, and Van Veen deployments. We are not calling down to the engineers requesting pumps to be turned on; we are not out on deck observing science evolutions. We went from the science labs being full of scientists running and analyzing their water samples, to an empty compartment. We went from having minimum two STARC techs working 24/7, to only two of us onboard working 0800 to 1800, packing up and preparing for the overhaul. I have the entire science sleeping quarters to myself, since the other STARC Tech and C4IT are on the 3rddeck. I have never gotten to say I have an entire deck aboard a ship to myself! Yesterday was Thanksgiving, and what a great feast the culinary specialists put out for us. The moral is highly affected by the quality of dishes the chefs put out, and we definitely lucked out with the delicious meals produced onboard. I am not even saying that because the CSCS (Culinary Specialist Senior Chief) was my A-school instructor.

It is hard to make cleaning up, breaking down, organizing, and packing sound fun and exciting, but something that has to be done, and you actually learn a lot taking apart a lot of the equipment. When breaking down the CTD’s I discovered that one of the brands of hose clamps shared my name, but of course they spelt it wrong!

Tomorrow we are due to arrive in Juneau and that's when I will catch my flight and head back home. I want to thank the MATE program for the opportunity to come onboard the USCGC Healy to learn with STARC, WHOI, and the U.S. Coast Guard. I am grateful to have been given the chance to help build upon my academic background through hands on training, and add to my experience in being the support of ocean exploration. I am always striving to challenge myself and continue my education to makemyself a valuable contribution to the next generation of ocean explorers. In the near future I wish continue my education and eventually obtain PhD in Exploration Sciences and Technology. I had a great time, and it was a pleasure meeting with and working with everyone. Fair winds and following seas! Time to get some rest before my next expedition!

#MATEintership #USCGCHealy #STARC #WHOI #SOI #HappyThanksgiving #USCG #NEANConvergence

Week 4: As the Sun Sets, Winter Awakes

Breezy Grenier on the USCGC Healy: What an exciting week it has been, chasing the formation of winter water around the Beaufort! We just wrapped up our last week of science, and started our steam back to Dutch Harbor.

It certainly has been a game of ping-pong going back and forth across the Beaufort Sea. Last week when we were starting our transit back West, and near Utqiaġvik (formerly Barrow) where we stumbled upon the formation of winter water, and when you stumble across a scientific phenomena, you to try and gather as much data as possible, in this case we needed to best document how it spreads across the Beaufort slope. So we headed back East, filling in the gaps between our CTD line transects, then we headed back West due to time constraints, and then because the Coast Guard crew was so amazingly efficient at the CTD cast evolutions, they bought us more time to head back East! I also want to mention, this week we also experienced our shortest days with just about 2 hours of daylight, and our coldest temperatures yet, dropping down to -21°C (-5°F) with -28°C (-18°F) wind chill. Bravo Zulu Captain and Crew of the Healy!!

The Franklin Mountains of the Brooks Range on the North Slope borders the Beaufort Sea. So on a clear day, during our two hours of sunlight, and our 6-ish hours of twilight, the majestic mountains were our backdrops. Even if it wasn't clear, it was snowing beautiful, big, fluffy snowflakes. If you are a snowboarder like I am, this just kills you. I teach snowboarding at Rhode Island's number one ski area, Yawgoo Valley, I also organize and lead the snowboarding staff as an Instructor Trainer and Snowboard Hill Captain, so I am very passionate about the sport. Yawgoo is pretty flat, with 95m (310ft) of elevation, so when waking up to fresh powder on the decks every day, and with the ocean between you and the soaring mountains, it's torture! Also getting news that back home that they just got their first snow of the season, I can hear my snowboard calling my name! I am also a polar and ice diver, and happen to be one of the members of the Sedna Epic Expedition, where we are snorkeling the Northwest Passage in 2020, so between no snowboarding and no scuba diving for the past 4 weeks, I am going through withdrawals! But the reality is, the mariner in me is still just as excited being on a ship up in the High Arctic in the beginning of winter, I am truly lucky. People always assume just because the water is cold, that there is no life, and high latitudes the water is always murky because it LOOKS dark. Oh on the contrary, the ocean is teeming with life! Winter in New England is my favorite time to go diving because the water is so much clearer, and instead of the average 3m of viability you can easily have up to 10m+, and unless you are at the foot of a glacier, or the mouth of a river same generally goes for the High Arctic, with the added bonus of icebergs.

During our transits back and forth between lines, gave me some "down time" to get back to work on creating and/or updating SOPs (standard order procedures). My learning style, I am a do-er. I learn best by actually working on a skill, so if there isn't a current opportunity to work on a task hands on, the next best option for me is to do a mock trial, allowing me to record observations, skills and steps. Especially when it comes to using different software. So far I created SOPs for importing Ice Imagery on QINSy, and updated XBT & XCTD cast procedures, and now creating processing procedures for POS MV, and updating Seapath.

Photo credit: Sarah Kaye, C4IT With only one more science stop to recover a mooring, we are full steam back to Dutch Harbor. One day and wake up before the science party disembarks, and then we will continue our journey to Juneau, Alaska. We will be disassembling all the equipment for the end of the science season and the ships dry-dock. Good-bye the world above the Arctic Circle, hope to see you soon! November 17th is when Utqiaġvik will have their last sunset, as it begins the two months of Arctic night.

#MATEInternship #USCGCHealy #arcticlife #snowboarding #sednaepic #polardiving #NEANConvergence #STARC #WHOI #chasingscience

Week 1: Up up up and Underway

Breezy Grenier on the USCGC Healy: Departing for the High ArcticAfter 23 hours of travel time turns into 32 hours and finally arriving in Dutch Harbor, the internship begins! The next day the science party arrived, and we are finally underway heading towards the waters around Point Barrow.

The flights to Dutch Harbor are always a hit or miss, but with 4 legs of flights, the flight to Dutch was the only flight NOT delayed. The previously flight delays, just happened to cause me to miss that flight, luckily there was a flight later in the day. It feels good to be back in Alaska. I cannot believe how much has changed over the past 12 years.

It is funny, after previously serving in the Coast Guard, you forget how small of a world it really is. Upon arriving I immediately ran into the Commanding Officer of the Healy, whom happened to be my previous CO when I served on the USCGC Hickory as a non-rate. I also ran into my old roommate from TranCen Petaluma and another whom was my A-School instructor. It's a large ship, with about 120 souls on board, so I can only imagine whom else I might run into. After a good nights sleep, I hopped right in, learning the ship and where everything was, and what my duties and responsibilities would be. I am working with STARC (Shipbased Technical Support in the Arctic) as a Tech Watch stander, and WHOI (Woods Hole Oceanographic Institute) is our science team aboard the Coast Guard Polar Ice Breaker Healy. We will be doing mooring work on the continental shelf of the Alaska Beaufort Sea, along with CTD work spanning the Chukchi and Canadian Beaufort Sea. Immediately getting to work I got to fabricate a bracket to hold an instrument, the scientist wanted to add to the CTD. Loving puzzles, I got quickly figured out how we would attach the instrument close enough to their other sensor, but far enough to not cause interference.

Photo Credit: Matt Hirsch The other issue was creating a structure strong enough where it would not cause vibrations. A saw, dremel, and some scrap metal did the job! We are deploying two test casts later today, fingers crossed the fabrication works out.

Once getting underway we booted up all the systems that would be running over the course of our voyage such as the multibeam, knudsen echosounder, EM122, ADCP, Hypack, QINSy, seawater flow through, pCO2, along with calibrating the instruments. Setting up, double, and triple checking the data flow, serial servers, and syncing the systems to ensure all the data is collected and it is being filed in an organized manor. Upon departing we had a good test to make sure all of our gear was secured for sea, heading straight into 6-8m seas. It looks like there is a high-pressure system on the horizon, so it’s forecasted to have smooth sailing as we go through the Bering Straight this weekend.