Hey All,
While the words ‘Trick or Treat’ can be heard all over the country this evening, Challenger seems to be encountering some tricks of his own. Looking at the currents at depth provided by Antonio, it seems that although at the surface the waters are flowing in a nice south easterly direction, at depth the flow is in the opposite direction. In the first figure below we have vectors showing the direction of the currents. At 300, 500 and 700m the currents in Challengers immediate location are to the North fighting us. Because of this we are only covering about 6km per surfacing.
The next figure also supports this theory as we go deeper in the water column, the northern flux intensifies.
For right now, the consensus is to just keep chugging away with the current with the current correction setting on so we don’t drift to the north or over shoot a way point change which could land us in treacherous bathymetry.
Finally, as we prepare for the final haul towards the Canaries, we have started to discuss where we would like to make port.
One place which caught our eye is the island of La Gomera. This Island has a few pretty cool features that are symbolic for this effort. First, is the location. Gomera is pretty far to the West of the archipelago which would make the trip out to recover the glider much easier and the distance we must fly shorter. There is also less shipping traffic in that area compared to some of the other islands (which is always a plus). Another appealing point is the name ‘Gomera.’ For those of you who have been following us from the beginning, the true name for this glider is Silbo (the glider was christened Challenger 1 to signify it is the first attempt at the Challenger mission). The name Silbo comes from the name of the whistling language ‘Silbo Gomero’ which was used to communicate through the extensive valleys on the island of Gomera. Lastly, there is historical significance that ties back to the landing of the Ru27 mission. When we took Scarlet across the Atlantic, we landed in the cozy little village of Baiona, Spain, where the Pinta made port in 1493 when Columbus returned from the first voyage to America. Antonio pointed out today that San Sebastián, the capitol and main port of Gomera was the last stop Columbus made before starting that historic voyage in 1492. This will be some thing to keep in mind over the next few months as Challenger gets closer to the Canaries.
Happy Halloween Everyone!
Lauren Cooney, Antonio Ramos & Nilsen Strandskov