Calms Seas at Makkovik Bank

The CCGS Amundsen arrived on-site at our first major sampling station early morning of July 19th, steaming through beautifully calm seas and clear skies. Named for the nearby northern Labrador Inuit community, the Makkovik (Mak-KO-vik) site had been mapped by multibeam sonar on a previous cruise as a joint effort by DFO, the Nunatsiavut government, an Amundsen Science to explore the unique features of the sea floor that local fish harvesters knew were there; a series of steep slopes in an otherwise uniform bottom. Two days of diving with the remotely operated vehicle (ROV) were planned to span two different slopes that could be seen in the multibeam maps, with a multitude of other sampling operations scheduled in between in the hopes of exploring as much of the area as possible within the two day stop.

Photo by: Kathryn Murray

In order to maximize the amount of data that can be collected throughout the cruise, the ship doesn't waste time dropping anchor; instead, the coast guard crew (and, by extension, the science team) maintains a 24hour watch cycle so that someone is always on the bridge and on deck. This means equipment can be operated at almost all hours of the day and night, and the position of the ship can be constantly adjusted as needed throughout each operation. The Amundsen captain and crew have long had experience with scientific operations aboard this vessel, which is invaluable. The moment one operation is completed - for example, the moment a dive is completed and the ROV is secured on deck - the ship can immediately move into the next operation. Every minute of the day and night are accounted for, and as operations are finished early, on time, or a bit late, the schedule is constantly updated.

Photo by: Laura Piccirillo

As with all carefully-laid plans, this first stop had some hiccups. Though the ROV piloting team has decades of experience working with remotely operated vehicles, the one onboard the ship this year is brand new, and adjustments are still part of the process. In fact, the dive in Makkovik was the first official scientific dive using the ROV. Working through the constraints of combining maiden scientific voyages with regular dive operations, the dives at Makkovik were shorter than expected, though still very fruitful. The steeper Makkovik slopes, now nicknamed "the hanging gardens of Makkovik", were covered in beautiful cold-water sponges and red-orange Primnoa gorgonian corals that grew horizontally out of the walls and hung down in long, branching strands that - as one of the longest-lived coral in the Labrador region - could have been growing there for hundreds of years.

Photo by: Kathryn Murray

The nights at Makkovik were just as interesting - filled with seawater collection, nets for zooplankton, and filming the slopes and troughs of the area with a drop camera. On the bow of the ship, a meteorological tower was set up to start sampling baseline levels of carbon dioxide, methane, and water vapours, and various collections of sediments from the surface all the way down to 9m deep cores were taken to analyze everything from the local microbial community to historical storms dating back to the Pleistocene.

Photo by: Kathryn Murray (Meng sampling the box core)

In the end, the ship stayed at Makkovik for just over two and a half days, during which the team saw the first distant icebergs of the trip, some beautiful sunrises and sunsets, and felt the change in the air as the days started getting longer and the weather chillier as the ship started to make its way further north.

Laura taking photos of icebergs (Photo: Kathryn Murray)

Written by: Sophie Wolvin