Mysterious Rings and Offerings to the Gods

Wednesday, June 6

Last night was the worst night yet, by a mile.  The 27-knot winds were from the southeast, meaning that we could not seek shelter near the shore as we did the previous night.  The ship pitched and rolled all night long, and it was tough just to stay in my bunk.  I took an extra blanket and stuffed it along one side of my bed. With my knees braced against the wall and my back pressed into the blanket, I was able to remain stationary for at least part of the night.  I must have woken up every half hour, hearing the noises of an unstable ship – pots clanging loudly in the galley, doors slamming shut after they worked themselves open, plaques falling off the walls.

I got out of bed at 5:30 since there was no point trying to sleep, and found my way to the bridge. I believe that this is one of the secrets to fighting seasickness, because you can see the swells coming in advance, anticipate the ship’s movements, and adjust your balance accordingly.  The waves were breaking over the bow, and the skies were their usual North Sea grey.  The mood on the bridge could only be described as somber, and the five men on duty were silent and unmoving due to lack of sleep, seasickness, and general misery.  I asked the Executive Officer what they usually do when morale is low, and he said, “Work.”  Since we couldn’t work, I asked what else we could do.  His response was, “I don’t know, morale's never been this bad before.” 

For some humor, I told the crew I was going to make an offering to the sea gods and goddesses, so that they would bring us better weather.  Legend says the gods like sweet things, so I collected some chocolate and fruit, and held a brief ceremony where I made a request and tossed little bits of sweets into the sea (photo left). They thought I was crazy, but I think it may have worked.

A few hours later, in spite of the stormy forecast, the bridge crew began having earnest conversations, and though I couldn’t understand French, I could tell by the feeling in the room that something was happening.  They had noticed the wind speed decreasing, and decided to wait half an hour to see if it would continue declining.  If it did, we could launch the sonar and get back to work.

30 Minutes Later

The mood of a ship changes in an instant, and word traveled fast that we now had an opportunity to work.  There was a tangible excitement in the air as crew members darted through the passageways, giving commands, putting on their gear, preparing to fire up the sonar system and get it in the water.  It was like the fog had lifted, and now there were smiles everywhere. One of the crewmen was whistling the theme song from the movie "Rocky" and it made me smile.

The final word from the Captain was that we were “go for launch,” so the Thales DUBM-44 sonar was deployed (photo top right), and we were off. We surveyed for the rest of the day (sonar command central is on bottom right), but did not find any really compelling targets – only ones that looked like rocks.  In the meantime, the divers on STYX dove on a few targets and described them as “rocks and sand.”  Still nothing solid to pin our hopes on.

Follow Up Note from Last Week: The Rings on the Seabed

Throughout the entire mission, we had been having to give way to a much larger commercial ship that was doing seismic surveys to search for oil in the seabed. In conversation about the target we had seen earlier in the week that consisted of two 35-foot rings, we wondered if these were perhaps some equipment left behind by the seismic ship.  I spoke with the ship’s Captain via the radio, and he indicated that the rings were not related to their work.

So once again, we towed the sonar over the location where we had seen the rings, and were surprised to find that they were no longer visible.  We thought that perhaps these were very large schools of fish who were circling their prey, but I asked a fisherman about this, and he was doubtful the fish would have been schooling that close to the seabed. The other popular theory had something to do with UFOs.  Forget about finding the BHR – I’ll take a UFO discovery any day, or even Atlantis!  But the rings will have to remain a mystery of the deep.