Climate Change in the Marine Realm

Currently, I'm at MARUM at the University of Bremen, Germany attending a summer school on marine climate change. Thus far, it's been quite a fascinating trip with engaging lectures from various ocean scientists (marine biologists, paleoceanographers, coastal ecologists, physical oceanographers etc.) and the chance to interact with students from all over Europe. Further, I'm really enjoying the European hospitality, mentality and atmosphere. 

Last week, we were based in the Alfred Wegener Institute's research station on Sylt, an island located at the northern-most portion of Germany. Moving from hot, tropical, volcanic islands to a cold, temperate, barrier island in a week was quite interesting, to say the least - geologically and ecologically. In particular, being around marine ecologists who knew all the intertidal species was really cool.

Some of the geomorphology on Sylt made me feel that I was on Arrakis (the abundant lugworms in the intertidal zone looked like tiny Shai-Huluds)

At Sylt, we attended lectures and conducted experiments on the effects of ocean acidification on marine biology. Specifically, we looked at echinoderms and their resiliance (or their lack of it) to more acidic oceans. Eco-physiologist, Sam Dupont (whom I had read about in Nature News when he stumbled upon a significant discovery in echinoderm physiology after one too many beers), in his infectiously enthusiastic manner, stressed on the importance of the harmful of effects of ocean acidification, combined with oceanic warming. It was also very neat to interact with Jelle Bijma on foraminiferal ecology and metabolism. 

Sam Dupont trying to take a blood sample from a brittle star (Asterias rubens)

We made our way down to Bremen from Sylt over the weekend and have been attending classes at Marum. We were fortunate enough to get a glimpse of the IODP Core repository - making me fortunate enough to have visited two of the three core repositories in the world (the others are in Texas A&M and Kochi University, Japan). Looking at cores which led to discoveries on the PETM, KT-Boundary and Mediterranean sapropels was fascinating!

The top core is from the Yucatan Basin, Gulf of Mexico and the discontinuity is the K-T Boundary; the core at the bottom is from the Walvis Ridge in the southern Atlantic Ocean and shows the infamous PETM event.

I will be in Germany for another ten days, after which I will finally get back to the normal grind in Austin (and need to prepare for AGU!) It's been a travel-intensive year alright!

Tropical Field Season Part II

I apologize for the big blogging slump over the last month and a half, when I returned to Austin after a two month field season in the Solomon Islands. An extremely tight schedule, including visa appointments, a paper submission, three AGU abstracts and much progress on my Gulf of Mexico sediment cores, is to blame for this hiatus (apart from procrastination). It's been one hectic July for me! So, it is quite ironic that my subsequent blog post is from back in the Solomon Islands!

We (Fred Taylor and I) left the Solomons in the last week of June after collecting many uplifted (dead) coral samples on land (with rock hammer and chisel) that were indicative of previous uplift events (earthquakes). We also found several huge (living) coral microatolls in shallow water that hold the keys to the amounts of vertical deformation pre-earthquake and post-earthquake. However, in order to read these microatolls, we need to cut them open - which takes more than a hammer and chisel. In fact, it requires a hydraulic/gas-powered drill/saw system - in other words, a lot of equipment (it clocked in at just over one tonne). Unfortunately, as things go awry when you're in the field, our equipment did not make it here last time and we were told that the shipment would arrive only two months later (it was sitting at the Brisbane dock waiting for a ship - the Kopoko Chief came to the rescue!) This is why we are back in the Western Province, Solomon Islands - and now, we have our equipment. Corals beware, we are armed!

Jumping right into it, a week ago, we were in the Florida Islands, a short boat ride away from Honiara, and cut open a bunch of microatolls. As these islands are relatively devoid of neotectonic activity, these corals will aid us in seperating the oceanographic signal (ENSO, sea-level rise etc.) from the tectonic signal (deformation of the land, earthquakes) that we see in the corals of the Western Province. Hauling the hydraulic chain-saw around (the selected weapon of choice) was quite an ordeal but it was no match for the logistical mess that we would endure while leaving for the Western Province.

Originally, we were scheduled to head west aboard the Pelican Express 2, a slick passenger vessel that would reach Gizo, our destination in the Western Province, in a mean 12 hours. This ship was to leave the Honiara dock at 7AM sharp on Sunday. All of our equipment (including the hydraulic chainsaw/drill, gas-powered chainsaw/drill and assorted tools) was at the Solomon Islands Geology Dept., a good 3km away from the dock. We were staying at the United Church Rest House, close to the dock. So, all we needed to do was: wake up early, wait for our truck (which we had already 'booked'), head over to the dept. and haul our equipment to the dock. Simple, right? On our part, we were awake and ready to go at 4:45AM. Our driver who presumably woke up late after a long night, reached the United Rest House at 6:15AM, after much pandemonium from our side while we had already tried to flag down several passing trucks (mind you, loading a tonne of equipment on a truck and unloading it takes a lot of time). But, finally, he had arrived! Crisis averted, right? Well, on the way to the Geology Dept., the truck spluttered, hemmed and hawed and finally came to an ominous stop a good kilometer away - it had run out of diesel! We were stranded on the way up a hill without fuel and without any passing traffic. It was 6:25AM. We still had a lot of work to do and there was only 35 mins for the Pelican Express to leave!

Slabbing a huge ~8m microatoll at Olasana Lagoon, southeast Ghizo

Standing on that hill, forlorn and distraught, ultimately, we hypothesized about the worst-case scenario (not a bad thing to do when one does field work): we don't find a truck to the department in the next 15 mins, go get diesel from the nearest petrol bunk (a cool 5km away), drive to the Geology Dept., load our gear and get it to the dock, forget about the Pelican Express and look to board a later ship. And this was exactly how it played out, resulting in a loss of money and time. The Fair Glory took off from the Honiara dock at 10:00AM, giving us plenty of time to load our equipment and a long 27 hrs later, we made it to Gizo.

At Gizo, we've been staying at the PT 109 restaurant - named after JFK's destroyer boat that was wrecked not far away, 70 years ago. We've been here for four days, cutting and slabbing coral microatolls and it already seems like a month! Each day is a battle against the sun and those tough, tough corals. However, looking at a cut slab is like opening a present - you never know what you're going to get! Depending on internet availability, I'll try to periodically update the blog on the interesting geology we chance upon.

Western Solomons Field Summary

Fred and I found some pretty good-sized coral microatolls (like the one I'm standing on). This was at Mbava Island, Vella Lavella and all these corals were killed by the 2007 8.1Mw earthquake.

After spending a total of 52 days of field work in the Solomon Islands, Fred and I begin our long journey back to Austin, Texas tomorrow. The past ~8 weeks have been a phenomenal experience for me: from the people, their cuisine, and language, the surrounding flora and fauna to the science. The science especially has been truly wonderful. In this region, despite it being relatively devoid of technological investment in complex earthquake monitoring equipment, I’m convinced that corals hold many answers to questions pertaining to the seismic cycle and related processes. These answers could prove useful to the advancement of scientific knowledge on earthquakes as well as policy directed towards hazard management (for earthquakes and tsunamis), not only in the Western Solomon Islands but globally.

Even though our initial field plan was nothing close to what was actually executed, I would say that we have thus far been largely successful (no crocodile bites even). We have found large coral microatolls that (we believe) hold the key to intricate vertical motions of the land over a complete earthquake cycle. We have also found intact, in-situ, paleo-uplifted coral on land that will shed light on earthquake recurrence, arc segmentation and megathrust ruptures.

Geological field work in the deep tropics is tough, tough work and there are many challenges. One of the biggest hurdles aside from all the critters, bad weather and logistics is accepting that the ideal sample cannot be found! Slowly you realize that the ones you’ve already found aren’t all that bad. All in all, my Solomon Islands experience has been fantastic with all its ups and downs.

As they say in pidgin, “Solomon Islands hemi barava naice! Tenkio tumas iufala evriwan!”