Defenders chief scientist joins research expedition in the Gulf

I board the Nancy Foster!

Gently, the roll started. At first the ship’s motion was barely perceptible, but it grew stronger as we exited the slip and entered the more open waters of Tampa Bay. We were underway. Time: 15:35 EDT, July 13, 2010. NOAA research vessel Nancy Foster was headed back out into the Gulf, her time at sea lengthened by unexpected events, only some of which had anything to do with a certain oil spill.

I had arrived quite late the previous night, by taxi, to find the ship moored at one of the piers operated by the U.S. Coast Guard-St. Petersburg sector. Adrenaline is a poor sleep aid, and I awoke early. This would be my first significant oceanographic expedition in many years; I supposed it was okay to be a little excited. What had the Nancy Foster found on its first two weeks? What would it find in its final leg, one that would transit the deep, far reaches of the Gulf of Mexico, just south of the Deepwater Horizon’s colossal failure?

What I learned at breakfast was that the Foster had not found oil so far. It HAD found nine Cuban refugees far to the west of the Florida Keys, adrift for 25 days in a shockingly small boat, starving and desperate. They had set out for a landfall in Honduras, only to be swept in the opposite direction by the very currents that will ultimately (and perhaps capriciously) determine the fate of the Horizon’s oil. Delays caused by this fortuitous rescue, plus a need to deploy as many scientists and research platforms for as long as feasible, had created a shore leave in which I was able to join up with the expedition. And five or six more days devoted to new discovery were added.

For the next several hours after our dockside departure, we all worked frantically to get up and running all our gear, instruments and equipment. After inhaling a quick dinner, I went up to the bridge to start running strip transects for recording oiled seabirds. As soon as we passed the last channel marker buoys, I began. There were a few terns actively diving for fish, mostly Sandwich terns and fewer royals. A lone laughing gull winged by. From the brilliant white underbellies of these birds, they seemed to be among the lucky ones.

NOAA research vessel "Nancy Foster"

Greenish, turbid water gradually turned to shades of blue. The sun passed behind fluffy clouds on the ocean’s horizon, turning the sky pastel orange, pink and yellow. And, then, straight ahead of the ship’s bow my binoculars lingered on a dark shape on the water. As we approached, it assumed the dimensions and shape of a booby, a tropical cousin of more northerly gannets.

 Sure enough, it was a third or fourth year subadult masked booby. Sitting in the water, with its tail cocked upward, it sat, and sat, and sat. Odd behavior for this seabird because they are curious, and like to check out ships, especially large ones. This one would not budge. It submerged its bill and head underwater, as if peering for a meal, but still did not move even as the huge Foster passed right next to it. Was that a smudge of misplaced brown on its breast? Frustratingly, I could not tell for sure. So I marked its oiling status as questionable, and began to wrap up. The sun was setting. Tomorrow would be another day.