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THE MAINE EVENT: FALL 2002 Predation by Gelatinous Zooplankton in the Gulf of Maine MISSION DISPATCH 1 • 08/31/02 Today's Weather - images courtesy of NOAA & RSMAS Dispatch by Harry Breidahl - Marine Education Society of Australasia [MESA] 
Early on Saturday morning the R/V Seaward Johnson II berthed at the Woods Hole Oceanographic
Institute dock, Woods Hole, Massachusetts. By that evening the last of the scientific crew
had flown into Boston and made their way down to the vessel. This most recent Maine Event cruise
for Fall 2002 is a truly international affair with representatives from France, Austria, Spain,
Norway and Australia. Introductions for the newcomers and greetings from old shipmates were
carried out under pleasant blue skies around barbequing tuna steaks, per kind favor of the
crew who had landed a couple of tuna on the voyage north from Florida.
A 6 am start on Sunday allowed us to view a pleasant sunrise over Woods Hole as the R/V Seaward Johnson II sailed north to the first survey site in the Gulf of Maine. We are 
headed for Wilkinson Basin and the first dive of the submersible
JOHNSON SEA-LINK I for this
three-week research cruise. Preparations for the dive are underway at a hectic rate with much
effort being put into setting up the acrylic containers (32 in all) that would be used to
collect and hold animals, the detritus samplers and two suction tube systems commonly known
as "critter gitters".
A long day was spent with these preparations and the unpacking and setting up of the special video profiler that had been shipped from France earlier. This activity was a job for Mark Picheral from the Station Zoologique in Villefranche-sur-Mer. A short safety briefing by Captain George Gunther on the 02 deck was also part of the first day program. The first dive of the trip was originally scheduled for 8 pm but, as often happens, a few small technical problems delayed this event until after 10.15 pm. The crew for this dive, the sub's 4469th, included sub crew Phil Santos and Hugo Marrero and scientific party Marsh Youngbluth and Tom Sornes. 
Lifting the sub off the deck and gently placing it into the rolling sea looked simple but I am
sure that it involves great skill by the ship and sub crews. The recovery, around 12.30 am, was
even more spectacular as it involves a wet suit clad member of the sub crew swimming across the
water to the JSL to connect a recovery line.
Although this dive did find an abundance of deep-sea life such as copepods (Calanus finmarchicus) and ctenophores (primarily Bolinopsis infundibulum) and small squid, very few colonies of the siphonophore Nanomia cara were seen. As this deep-living sea jelly is the main target of the research cruise, it was decided to sail to a deeper water site and take-up the search there.  |  |
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