{"id":7510,"date":"2013-10-25T14:15:45","date_gmt":"2013-10-25T22:15:45","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/mlmlblog.wordpress.com\/?p=7510"},"modified":"2020-10-13T16:53:33","modified_gmt":"2020-10-13T23:53:33","slug":"diving-the-mlml-seawater-intakes","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/mlml.sjsu.edu\/student-life\/2013\/10\/25\/diving-the-mlml-seawater-intakes\/","title":{"rendered":"Diving the MLML Seawater Intakes"},"content":{"rendered":"
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By Diane Wyse, Physical Oceanography Lab<\/h3>\n

Earlier this week I volunteered to dive on the MLML seawater intakes, located about 200 m due west of the Monterey Bay Aquarium Research Institute (MBARI) and 17 m below the surface.\u00a0 The intakes supply seawater to multiple sites around Moss Landing, including the aquarium room at MLML, the Test Tank at MBARI, and the live tanks at Phil\u2019s Fish Market.<\/p>\n

\"Location<\/a>
Location of the intake pipes offshore. Image: MLML\/Google Earth (2013)<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

The purpose of the dive was to attach a surface float to a subsurface float located at a depth of about 15 feet.\u00a0 A secondary objective was to visually inspect the intakes, which can be viewed in the video below.<\/p>\n

\"The<\/a>
The view of Moss Landing from approximately above the intakes. Photo: Diane Wyse (2013)<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

So how do you find an intake system 50 ft below the water?<\/strong><\/p>\n

To execute the operation, Assistant Dive Safety Officer Scott Gabara and I took a whaler from the MLML Small Boats with the assistance of boat driver Catherine Drake.\u00a0 We used the best GPS coordinates previously called upon to locate the intakes, then threw a spotter surface float attached to a line and weight that unraveled to the seafloor.\u00a0 We followed that line to the bottom and practiced our circle search skills until we found the first of the two intakes.\u00a0 While anchoring the search line I saw a pipefish, a couple flatfish, and not much else.\u00a0 During our descent and ascent we spotted half a dozen sea nettles, but on the sandy bottom it appeared pretty desolate.\u00a0 The intakes, on the other hand, provide a hard substrate for sessile invertebrates and their predators to form a lively little oasis in the sand.\u00a0 The first thing you notice when you come upon the intakes are the large white Metridium anemones.\u00a0 If you take a closer look at the video, around 15 seconds in, you can spot a little octopus scurrying for cover.\u00a0 After inspecting the first intake we moved to the second, that\u2019s right, completely submerged by sand, with the line extending up to the subsurface float.\u00a0 Though the video is short you can see some of the organisms residing on the line include seastars, Metridium, caprellids or \u201cskeleton shrimp\u201d, and my favorite marine invertebrate: nudibranchs.\u00a0 Hermissenda<\/a> (opalescent) nudibranchs, to be exact.\u00a0 I wish I had a chance to take still photos while I was out there, but we had a job to do.\u00a0 We successfully tied the surface float to the line and removed old line, thus making it much easier for future divers to\u00a0study<\/a> sediment movement and perform maintenance on the intake pipes.<\/p>\n

I'll admit had another motivation for volunteering for the dive. \u00a0 Beyond helping out and increasing my scientific diving experience, I was curious about the system. \u00a0In 2011 and 2012 I worked as a research assistant for CeNCOOS<\/a>, and helped maintain the oceanographic instruments at the MLML shore lab and ensure that the public data portal was operational. \u00a0That system is dependent upon water flowing in from the intakes. \u00a0I learned even more about the seawater system in my chemical oceanography class, so it was really cool to see the pipes from under the sea.\u00a0 The visibility for most of the dive was much better than it seems in this video, as we spent most of the time working further up in the water column away from the fluffy layer composed of detritus and fine-grain sand.<\/p>\n

When my dive buddy and I returned to the surface we met back up with our boat, reeled in the line for the first float, and cruised back to the harbor. \u00a0Another day, another successful dive!<\/p>\n

\"Diane<\/a>
Divers Diane Wyse and Scott Gabara with the new surface float for the seawater system. Photo: Catherine Drake (2013)<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<\/div>\n<\/div><\/div><\/div><\/div><\/div>","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

By Diane Wyse, Physical Oceanography Lab Earlier this week I volunteered to dive on the MLML seawater intakes, located about 200 m due west of the Monterey Bay Aquarium Research Institute (MBARI) and 17 m below the surface.\u00a0 The intakes supply seawater to multiple sites around Moss Landing, including the aquarium room at MLML, the […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":291,"featured_media":20015,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[15],"tags":[92,118,158],"class_list":["post-7510","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-drop-inblog","tag-diving","tag-fish","tag-invertebrates"],"distributor_meta":false,"distributor_terms":false,"distributor_media":false,"distributor_original_site_name":"MLML Student Life","distributor_original_site_url":"https:\/\/mlml.sjsu.edu\/student-life","push-errors":false,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/mlml.sjsu.edu\/student-life\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/7510","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/mlml.sjsu.edu\/student-life\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/mlml.sjsu.edu\/student-life\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mlml.sjsu.edu\/student-life\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/291"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mlml.sjsu.edu\/student-life\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=7510"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/mlml.sjsu.edu\/student-life\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/7510\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":20693,"href":"https:\/\/mlml.sjsu.edu\/student-life\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/7510\/revisions\/20693"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mlml.sjsu.edu\/student-life\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/20015"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/mlml.sjsu.edu\/student-life\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=7510"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mlml.sjsu.edu\/student-life\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=7510"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mlml.sjsu.edu\/student-life\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=7510"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}