Back to the field

Over the last few weeks of July, Aran and I have have been preparing for separate field projects taking place this August. Aran is going back to Alaska to carry out a suite of studies on beluga whales and I am heading to Palau, collaborating with Anne Cohen's lab at WHOI to deploy acoustic recorders and collect a number of water and coral samples.

Aran in the WHOI truck, after having safely secured our hi flyer.

Our preparations were brought to an abrupt halt on Tuesday when we received word from a shark researcher that part of one of our local moorings had washed up on a beach in Harwich, on the south shore of Cape Cod. Aran and I immediately got in a truck and headed to the outer cape, where, sure enough, our hi flyer was sitting right on the beach.

This hi flyer was part of one of three moorings that we currently have deployed in Nantucket Sound, collected baseline acoustic recordings year-round. These recordings will be used to determine whether the soundscape changes after wind farm construction starts in the Sound. We periodically service these moorings, but occasionally some go missing or get damaged in the meantime. Thanks to some helpful researchers working in the area and a quick response this time, we were able to salvage at least part of this mooring.

Check back here for updates from the field over the next few weeks as Aran and I check in from our respective field projects.

Max Kaplan