LAST WEEK! :( WHOOOT! NO MORE SEA SICKNESS...for now

This week of our amazing journey around Florida took place back at my home school of USFSP. On Tuesday we boarded the R/V Weatherbird II and went 18.25 miles offshore. We probably would have went further but it already was about a $10,000 cruise. The class was split into different teams and I was paired with Cara and a new student aboard for the ride Noel. Our team was assigned to analyze water quality at different depth via chemical tests. The tests conducted included nitrate, nitrite, phosphate, ammonia, and Carbon Dioxide. We conducted these tests on water collected from the bottom, the middle of the water column, and from right below the surface. The one test that showed significant results was the phosphate levels decreasing with depth which went with what we learned about how phytoplankton and bacteria recycle nutrients up and down the water column.
Aside from doing work on the boat, we were given the chance to explore during our free time and the first place I went to was the captains cabin. There were two different monitors used as a radar for everything on the surface within a certain radius of the vessel. There was a GPS with many stored routes that have already been done before by the vessel and the captain could simply set the GPS to whichever trail he wanted and the boat has an auto pilot system that follows that trail. I was even given a chance to drive the boat (even though it didn't take much effort because the autopilot was doing all the hard work, BUT HEY! I got to turn the ship a couple times and it was fun!). We also went to the bow of the boat and a few times throughout the day, we saw bottle-nose dolphins that would swim up to the vessel and jump in the wake that it was creating, doing a bunch of flips.
Overall my experience on the Weatherbird was nothing short of amazing and I hope to end back up on a research vessel very soon as a possible future career.

water quality testing in the lab with the groupies

bottlenose dolphins jumping in the wake :)