We departed on Tuesday evening around 20:00, Francesca Budillon, our head scientist on this cruise has been very busy reevaluating our sampling stations due to a conflict with NATO which is conducting military exercises with a submersible in the northeast section of our testing zone and to the storm fronts which we encountered. Yesterday the swells were 1-2 meters high and many of us spent the day in bed. Originally it was going to take us 28 hours to reach the first sampling section. We will have to depend on the weather and might not get to all of those first points. Another big storm front is expected around midnight.

Currently the scientists are using CHIRP, to acquire data below the seabed, which will later be merged with the multi-beam mapping of the surface of the sea bottom. These new data will enhance our knowledge of poorly studied parts of the Tyrrhenian Sea and also increase the resolution of the previous mapping which was conducted many years ago and without all the advanced techniques available today.

Last night I attended a briefing where all the current maps were laid out. Then the scientists were invited to make comments regarding the sampling points, and which ones were of interest to their respective working plan. This first leg of the cruise is very different from SUB1 as we investigate another area (Sicily-Sardinia Channel) and have primarily geoscientists and only four biologists. The second leg of the cruise, revisiting the sampling stations covered in SUB1, will have more biologists and focus on the water masses. Well that is all for now, I am Siri Campbell reporting from the R/V Urania.

Francesca's Briefing