by 
Friday, August 19, 2022
Today we spent the morning learning more about the R/V Sally Ride by touring the bridge, the server room, and the science gear room. I’ve really enjoyed seeing the ship behind-the-scenes, and the crew have been super welcoming and helpful in their tours and descriptions of machinery and job roles.
Up on the bridge, Captain Cameron showed us the array of ship system controls, radar and charts, the steering system, and the dynamic positioning system. This ship uses a unique adjustable forward propeller that can hold the ship in a precise position for science operations such as CTD (conductivity, temperature, and depth) deployments and plankton net tows. In addition to the ship controls, Cameron also described his career path from a lifeguard all the way to ship captain.
Captain Cameron answers our questions about plotting course and steering the ship.
Next, we toured the server room, bathymetry, and data collection station with the IT specialist, Jeff. His station consists of an enormous array of 15 monitors that, among other things, show real-time fluorescence, the ship’s position, camera feeds, radar, and a bathymetry feed that visualizes the sea floor topography under the ship. The data are continuously collected by the ship, saved, and available for researchers to use in their projects.
IT specialist Jeff’s dizzying array of monitors for data collection.
Our last tour of the day was led by the Restech (Research Tech), Ian, who brought us to the science gear room, which holds a variety of tools related to the winch (for deploying science gear), extra CTD bottles and gear, one of many firefighting gear caches, oil spill response gear, and a collection of wooden plugs in case of an emergency hull breach. We finished out the morning by learning, practicing, and racing to tie knots such as the bowline.
Ship operations require crew members to perform multiple duties – such as standing watch on the bridge, firefighting, repairing and maintaining machinery and gear, and supporting the science team on board. Many thanks to the R/V Sally Ride crew!
– Azrael Wilson
