by by Tess Weathers, Chabot College
The R/V Thompson has effectively become a time machine: we are moving back in time through two time zones as we travel from Seattle to Hawaii, plus we are experiencing the human-created phenomenon of Daylight Savings. At 2:00 am (02:00), on the morning of November 5th, many states in the US shifted their clocks back one hour to give us more sunshine in the morning. But what happens when you’re in the middle of the Pacific Ocean?
Typically, the time on the ship is determined by the Captain. As we cross through time zones, the Captain can announce precisely when to adjust the clocks, or they can choose to change the clocks at the beginning or end of the cruise to match the destination’s time. Our Captain announced the typical 02:00 “Fall Back” last night, which shouldn’t be too hard for a group of scientists to figure out… right?
If you are on land, perhaps you would just do nothing until your phone updates automatically, then maybe you figure out how to change the time on the stove and microwave. But at sea, when phones don’t have service and the internet bandwidth is capped, what would you do to make sure you get up in time for 07:15 breakfast? Will your phone automatically reset? Or will it stay the same because it lacks signal?
One method would be to use analog time. Rebecca Sperry from Salt Lake Community College brought along her trusty analog watch. She knew that without changing her clock, she’d have to head up to breakfast when her watch said 08:15. No resets needed, and Rebecca was first in line at the mess for some fresh steel cut oats and strawberries. Lucky for me, Rebecca is my roommate, so I was right behind her!
Merry Wilson from Scottsdale Community College had another novel approach to keeping track of the time. She did the math ahead of time to calculate exactly how long it would be until breakfast, including the “Fall Back”. She then set an 11-hour timer that would sound at breakfast, regardless of what time her phone showed. She arrived at breakfast on-time for some delicious bacon and eggs.
Many other scientists decided to be proactive and set their phones back manually by one hour when they went to bed, then set their breakfast alarm as usual. As Rebecca, Merry, and I were chomping away at breakfast, bewildered scientists began to wander by. “What time is it? My phone says 06:30, how are you eating breakfast so early?”. Considering breakfast is only offered from 07:15 – 08:00, and we were in the midst of fueling ourselves for the day, I was pretty confident in the cook’s estimation of the time.
So what happened? Even without cellular signal, phones can still automatically adjust for Daylight Savings. The scientists who set their clocks back one hour manually were also subject to an hour “Fall Back” that happened automatically, putting them 1-hour behind the ship’s actual time. As we were in the midst of the heated time debate, we heard word from Marine Technician Liz that there were dolphins off the starboard side. It turns out that it doesn’t matter what time your watch says, Dolphin-Watching Time is universal.
