Nine days in and the team continues to roll right along. Work on the Cannon Site was nearly completed today after Hannah, Kelsey, and I donned our SCUBA gear and slipped beneath the surface to complete a few trilateration measurements. Our goal for the morning: map in some of the larger coral heads that dot the site.
A strange thermocline greeted us when we hit the water: cold on the surface, warm below. We worked efficiently as a team, choosing to map pronounced corals and using corresponding cannon datums for trilateration measurements. I held the dummy end of the tape as Kelsey stretched the smart end to the central point of each coral head. Hannah recorded measurements, dimensions, and the depth of each coral. We also took depth readings on each of the cannon datums to understand the general slope of the site. Most of the coral heads were massive starlet corals, though lettuce coral was prevalent on the site as well. One magnificent Elkhorn coral marked the area between cannon six and seven.
Once we finished our measurements, we surfaced to collect some cameras. Good visibility is rare on the cannon site, so we took advantage of the clear(er) water. Hannah took stills of the site while Kelsey and I roved around with a GoPro. We tried our best to get overall shots of the cannon, while also zooming in on some features. We were able to capture some of the stray bricks found throughout the site, too. We enjoyed our second short dive, snapping photos and exploring the site on our own. When we finally surfaced, Dr. Harris and Sydney jumped in on snorkel to snap a few more photos and gather more depth readings.
The rest of the ECU crew continued to map in units on the Brick Site, but us cannon folk were not complaining: the visibility was great for once!
Post-processing involved adding the coral heads to the overall site plan and typing our data into a more organized format. With this new data, we should be closing the Cannon Site soon. Each day seems to pass quicker and quicker but there are so many things we could still do. The small brick site associated with the Cannon Site could be further investigated and there is much work to be completed on the Brick Site proper.
My favorite part about today was the seamless teamwork between we three divers. We made light work of our tasks, which shows how important it is to communicate effectively both before and during the dive (especially when collecting data!).
-Melissa
