This is day 4 of an enforced wait aboard the Hésperides. The ship ran into a windstorm south of Madagascar over the weekend. We experienced it as more pitching, which sent some folks to their bunks to recuperate from seasickness and sent at least one scientist’s breakfast back into his bowl in the dining room. It also confined the scientists to less of the ship. The top photo shows a handful of them waiting around at the service door. They’re not allowed on deck without a Navy escort during high seas so I’ve decided to show a few photos of windows and portholes, which are the way most of the scientists see the ocean most of the time.
Category Archives: Blog
Malaspina Expedition: First workday
I decided last night to join the 4:30am Neuston net team and the 5:00am Conductivity-Temperature-Depth rosetta deployment. These are gangly-looking devices the size of a go-kart and a Madrid street recycling bin, respectively.
My sea legs weren’t that great yesterday. I wobbled a lot and hit the wall sometimes while walking down corridors. My stomach, luckily, is doing much better–no problems at all and I sleep like a brick. Continue reading Malaspina Expedition: First workday
Malaspina Expedition: Gearing up
I’m joining the Malaspina expedition, a Spanish oceanographic cruise
circling the globe in the wake of Alessandro Malaspina’s 1789-1794
exploratory voyage (http://www.expedicionmalaspina.es). I will embark
on the Hespérides in Cape Town later this week bound for Perth, a
months’ voyage across the Indian Ocean, all told.
During the cruise I’ll be writing about the science and the scientists
for Nature. The blog posts should appear on The Great Beyond:
http://blogs.nature.com/news/thegreatbeyond/.
I’ll also tweet about my experiences aboard @lucaslaursen
(http://twitter.com/#!/lucaslaursen), in the grand tradition of my
previous short-form reporting adventures: @apolloplus40
(http://twitter.com/#!/apolloplus40) and the Harvard Borkoldoy
expedition (http://www.harvardmountaineering.org/borkoldoy/updates/),
which took place back before Twitter even existed!
Got tips for me? This is my first long ocean voyage and my first time
in the southern hemisphere, not to mention the first time I’ve ever
had to buy a pair of steel-toed, calf-height rubber boots for a
reporting trip!
-Lucas
Iceland Reporting Trip Roundup
I went to Iceland in April to report on volcano monitoring during the Eyjafjallajökull eruption for Science Magazine.
That story, which appeared 23 April 2010, is here.
A pair of photos from my field trips appeared in my aunt’s Long Island newspapers (L&M Publications) the week of 26 April. See them here.
A first-person essay on the visit appeared in Global Talent, a Catalan science website, on 4 May, here.
Another feature, including two of my photographs, appeared in the Financial Times Weekend Magazine on 22 May, here.
A news item appeared in Discover Magazine in the September issue, here.