The new cohort, East West XXVIII, is here and just finishing up the 3rd week of classes. Yesterday was one of the highlights of the Nahant portion of the program, our annual oceanography trip on the R/V Gulf Challenger out of New Castle, New Hampshire. Sampling included the use of the Shipek grab sampler, a corer, a Niskin bottle, and several CTD casts at stations from ~1 mile offshore up into the Piscatacqua River estuary. The core sample was particularly neat, as we cored an area where the more recent organic layer (including some cool polychaetes) of the ocean bottom near the river mouth overlies the Presumpscot Formation, composed of a clay layer deposited 16,000 years ago when the retreating Ice Age glaciers were melting.
Core showing the Presumpscot formation (light gray, bottom) and organic (dark gray, top) layers.
Presumpscot creations
Deploying the CTD
East West XXVIII