Greenpeace

March 10, 2006

We are currently about a day away from St. Helena. We are heading there to find a "smooth piece of water" so that we can check to see if we have rope tied around the port side propeller. By the way, this also marks our entry into the tuna fishing grounds - this is where we will start to look for pirate fishing vessels. We will maintain a zigzag pattern to try to identify and document as many illegal vessels as possible. We will also track ships from this area heading up into Las Palmas, sending their illegally caught fish onto Europe.

But back to the topic at hand - science and rope around the propeller?

Part of the goal of the Defending our Oceans tour is to gain a real understanding of surface waste in the world's oceans. The data that exists at the moment is higgedly piggedly, this research will be a valuable contribution to our understanding.

I'm writing this email from the stern of the ship...wireless internet - cool huh...but what I am actually doing here is looking at this contraption that was built at the Greenpeace science labs in Exeter and shipped out to South Africa where it also joined the Espy. It is bright yellow - and has many different names depending on who you talk to and what has just happened with it, but generally in better times it is the "yellow thing". Essentially it is a steel catamaran that has a net that trails from its middle out behind it. The catamaran allows the net to stay open at the ocean's surface. We have dropped it into the water twice. We used a crane to lift it over the side and then with a RIB in the water pulled it to the rear of the vessel. The first time seemed reasonably successful but modifications had to be made. The modifications were made and in she went again - it was quite choppy and the results were not so good - rope around the propeller - possibly - the net ripped in several places, the catamaran hitting the side of the Espy. Not a good test by any accounts - except a lot was learned.

Today the fitter on board is going to make a boom for the catamaran so that it will be fixed by steel to the side of the Espy - no trailing it behind us. We will run another test deploying and retrieving with this new system tomorrow while we are in the calmer waters of St. Helena.

Once it is rigged correctly it will sample surface debris as the tour makes it way around the world over the next year - providing Greenpeace and the scientific community with some real understanding of pollution in our oceans from which to start to effect change.

Well it is nearly eight - time for me to head to the galley for a galley maid I am.

Take care,
Celeste

March 3, 2006 

Well, I am currently about a third or so of the way up the Namibia coast - though no land in sight of course.
 
It is great to be on board. The weather is perfect, and I am finding my way around my new little world. I am about to embark on my fourth day out - but I guess my day's are  typical already. The wake up is at 7.30 though I am usually up long before (the sunrises have been magnificent). Work starts at 8. I usually spend some time down in the stores in fridges. When we set sail everything was everywhere so I have been organizing the food into some order. We have two large walk in freezers - one for veg and one for meat. We also have two large walk-in fridges - a cheese/tofu/milk etc. and one for veg. there is also a cold lobby area for all of these fridges.
 
We then also have two dry stores - one for things like rice, flour, beans and the other for canned goods, sauces etc. Then by ten I start to cook. Lunch is at 12 and every other day I clean the galley afterwards.  I then have a small break and get back into dinner - which is at six - and do the clean up on the same day as I cleaned lunch. So usually I'll be finished by 7.30 - 8pm.

Miguel, the cook, is a great guy - very funny and good to work for.
 
I am sharing a cabin with a deckhand, Marta, who is probably the best cabin-mate to ever have. Our cabin is so beautiful, we have rugs on the floor, plants and flowers, a music system, oil burning and beautiful pictures everywhere - it is almost the lap of luxury!
 
So I will keep it short and sweet and write more tomorrow, about life onboard and the campaign. It is almost 7.30 and I need to eat and get dressed still. Tonight one of the engineers is taking me on a tour of the engines - my big Friday night out on the town  ;-)  - so hopefully I will learn some interesting stuff I bribed him with cheese!). We are using the e-drive - it is the diesel-electric engine. It consumes about a third of the amount of diesel as the regular engines. With it we maintain a speed of around 9 knots.
 
Take care and more soon!
Celeste