According to  marine archaeologists the photos are so precise that they can view the wreck as the great ship were removed from the site and reconstructed – piece by piece – on dry land.

The image mosaics are part of a collection containing over 200 optical mosaics created by the Advanced Imaging and Visualization Laboratory (AIVL) at the Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution (WHOI). The original imagery was collected by WHOI during “Titanic Expedition 2010,” an effort funded by Premier Exhibitions, Inc., the parent company of RMS Titanic, Inc. Post-processing of the optical data was funded by Premier Exhibitions Inc. and the National Geographic Society.

The AIVL, led by Bill Lange, used optical and sonar images collected during the expedition by a specially equipped remotely operated vehicle (ROV) and two autonomous underwater vehicles (AUVs), to stitch together the richly detailed, comprehensive views of the ship and wreck site.

The vehicles carried a combination of sonars used to make wide-area maps and advanced 3-D camera systems used to conduct detailed forensic-type investigations. Although the individual robotic systems provided new information about some pieces of Titanic, the fusion of the imagery provides for the first time a comprehensive view of the wreck site.

“‘Titanic Expedition 2010′ was arguably the most technologically advanced scientific expedition to Titanic,” said expedition organizer Chris Davino, president of RMST, the salvor-in-possession of RMS Titanic and its wreck site. “For RMST, and me personally, this was an incredible opportunity to bring together the leaders in the field of underwater survey and exploration to spectacular effect.”

In addition to AIVL, participants in the expedition included WHOI’s Ocean Systems Lab, led by Gregory Packard, which operated the two REMUS 6000 AUVs; archaeologists from the National Oceanographic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) and the National Park Service (NPS); and representatives from the Waitt Institute, owner of the two REMUS AUVs. WHOI Director of Special Projects David Gallo was co-expedition leader along with P.H. Nargeolet of RMST.

“Until now some of the most memorable images we had of Titanic were created by acclaimed artist Ken Marschall,” said Gallo. “Ken’s paintings are fantastic, but we finally have the technologies and techniques to see the Titanic wreck site as it really is, in its entirety and in the context of the surrounding seascape. Even though our mission was scientific—to create the first archaeological map of Titanic—the results have attracted immediate public interest across the globe. It’s very rewarding.”

“Titanic has been a great driver and motivator for imaging, lighting and telemetry technologies in the deep sea,” said Lange, director of WHOI’s AIVL. Lange was a member of the 1985 and 1986 WHOI teams that first discovered and explored the wreck. “There’s no doubt in my mind that the public’s interest in Titanic helped propel the development of many of the technologies we use to explore the deep sea today.”

From the data collected at sea, the AIVL stitched together more than 250 individual mosaics to complete this comprehensive view of the ship and of the many thousands of objects in the surrounding wreck site. “Collecting the information at sea was challenging, but land-based processing of all of the data into useful information was equally challenging,” said Lange.

The work contributes to an effort by NOAA and NPS, two U.S. governmental agencies developing a “site formation plan” to tell the story of how the ship broke apart and where pieces of the ship fell to the seafloor. It is part of RMST’s overarching effort to advance ongoing efforts to preserve the wreck site as a cultural heritage site.

In their first mission, the two REMUS AUVs used side-looking sonar to define the total extent of the Titanic wreck site in the context of the surrounding seafloor terrain. This initial survey area is approximately 3 by 5 nautical miles—an area about the same size as Manhattan Island. This map was then used to define a tighter work area that focused specifically on the large pieces of Titanic (the bow and stern) and on the many thousands of artifacts that fell to the seafloor as the ship broke up and sank. The REMUS AUVs were then sent into this area—roughly equivalent in size to Midtown Manhattan—to make detailed down-looking maps that would be used to guide subsequent ROV operations.

“We modified a commercial ROV from Phoenix International by reworking the power system, telemetry, lighting, cameras, and flotation system and turned it into probably one of the world’s best underwater, close-up, optical survey vehicles,” said Lange.

The Titanic wreck site now represents perhaps the best-surveyed part of the world’s deep ocean. Using digital data, views extend from surface data collected by a satellite to the detailed underwater data that can resolve a teacup or the filaments on a crab’s leg.

Aside from the public fascination with Titanic, the mapping and science is required in order to best understand how to manage the wreck site. By comparing the data collected in 1985 and 1986, for example, the 2010 images and data will help provide a detailed picture of the condition of the wreck and its rate of deterioration over time. In addition, scientists can study the marine animals that have made the ship’s hull their home to better understand how deep-sea ecosystems develop and evolve.

“There are very few places on the bottom of the ocean that we have a 25-year history of what’s happened there, and this study will help scientists and others understand the long term fate of wrecks,” said Lange. “Having a better understanding of the conditions and long-term changes that can occur to these shipwrecks from corrosion, microbial activity, and the pressure in the deep sea will give policymakers and environmental managers the tools and data they need.”

“We are proud that our long experience in the deep ocean has been able to contribute so much to uncovering the full story of Titanic. For us, this has been an important opportunity to show how our advanced technical, imaging, and operations capabilities can combine effectively, whether for scientific, environmental, forensic, or historical purposes,” said WHOI President and Director Susan Avery.

Many of the images including the map, are a direct output of “Titanic Expedition 2010.” RMS Titanic will be adding both still images and interactive applications of the work done by WHOI to its touring exhibits, “Titanic: The Artifact Exhibition.” A full list of cities where these mosaics and more exclusive content from the most recent expedition will be on display is available online at www.rmstitanic.net.

Samuel Weiser, CEO and President of Premier Exhibitions, Inc. noted, “The contribution of Bill Lange’s and Greg Packard’s teams at WHOI have provided RMS Titanic, Inc. with provocative and engaging new content for our “Titanic: The Artifact Exhibition” exhibits and we are currently adding these features to enhance the story we tell of Titanic.”

The April 2012 issue of National Geographic is on newsstands now.

The App

If looking at photos is not interactive enough for you then be sure to download the new app by National Geographic titled Building the Titanic. The app takes you – step by step- from the great ship’s birth in 1908 when the first design for the liner was approved by White Star lines to an interactive timeline that follows the building of the Titanic from March 1909 when her keel was laid to April 1912, when the vessel embarked on her first and last voyage.

Related Video:

Curious how they captured such detailed footage in the dark depths of the North Atlantic? Well here’s a video look at the camera’s used by researchers on the expedition:

Click here to view the embedded video.

Scientists retrieve a CTD rosette to the deck of the R/V Ka'imikai-O-Kanaloa in June 2011. The team on the ship sampled water from the surface to as deep as 2000 meters at 30 locations in the Northwest Pacific ranging from 600 kilometers to 30 kilometers off the coast of Japan.

An international research team is reporting the results of a research cruise they organized to study the amount, spread, and impacts of radiation released into the ocean from the tsunami-crippled reactors in Fukushima, Japan. The group of 17 researchers and technicians from eight institutions spent 15 days at sea in June 2011 studying ocean currents, and sampling water and marine organisms up to the edge of the exclusion zone around the reactors.

Led by Ken Buesseler, a senior scientist and marine chemist at the Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution (WHOI), the team found that the concentration of several key radioactive substances, or radionuclides, were elevated but varied widely across the study area, reflecting the complex nature of the marine environment. In addition, although levels of radioactivity in marine life sampled during the cruise were well below levels of concern for humans and the organisms themselves, the researchers leave open the question of whether radioactive materials are accumulating on the seafloor sediments and, if so, whether these might pose a long-term threat to the marine ecosystem. The results appear in the April 2 online edition of the journal Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences (PNAS).

“Our goal was to provide an independent assessment of what the Japanese were reporting and also to get further off shore to sample in places where we thought the currents would be carrying most of the radionuclides,” said Buesseler. “We also wanted to provide as wide ranging a look as possible at potential impacts on the marine system to give a better idea of what was going on in the region, but also to provide a stronger baseline from which to measure future changes.”

On March 11, 2011, a magnitude 9.0 earthquake caused a tsunami that devastated the northeast coast of Japan and severely damaged the Fukushima Dai-ichi Nuclear Power Plant. In the weeks following, emergency crews poured tons of water directly onto the reactors to keep them cool and prevent them from going critical. Much of the contaminated water washed directly into the Northwest Pacific or collected in the basement of the reactor buildings and seeped slowly out, carrying with it a number of different radionuclides. In addition, several explosions in the reactor buildings sent additional radioactive materials into the atmosphere, much of which eventually landed in the ocean.

Among the materials released were cesium-134 and -137, two radioactive isotopes that do not occur naturally in the ocean. Cesium-134 has a half-life (the time it takes for one half of a given amount of radionuclide to decay) of a little over two years, and so could come only from the reactors at Fukushima. Cesium-137 has a half-life of roughly 30 years and is known to have entered the Pacific as a result of aboveground nuclear weapons tests in the 1950s and 60s, providing a benchmark against which to measure any additional releases from the reactors.

Buesseler, who began his scientific career studying the transport and mixing of artificial radionuclides in the ocean from sources such as weapons testing and the 1986 explosion at Chernobyl, recognized the importance of organizing an oceanographic research mission soon after events at Fukushima began to unfold. With primary support  from the Gordon and Betty Moore Foundation and additional support from the National Science Foundation, he brought together an international group that included physical oceanographers Steven Jayne and Irina Rypina, also from WHOI, and marine biologist Nicholas Fisher from the State University of New York (SUNY) Stony Brook.

The group departed Yokohama, Japan, on June 6 aboard the University of Hawaii research vessel Ka’imikai-o-Kanaloa and sailed a saw-tooth pattern that began 600 kilometers (350 miles) offshore and came as close as 30 kilometers (18 miles) from the damaged power plant. Along the way, the group conducted extensive water sampling from the surface to as deep as 1,000 meters (3,200 feet) and made more than 100 net tows to collect samples of phytoplankton, zooplankton, and small fish. They also released two dozen drifters, instruments that move with ocean currents and report their position via satellite back to shore.

In addition to their own samples, the group also collected water that they later shipped to labs at seven other institutions. Together, the ongoing effort is examining 15 different radionuclides likely to have been released from Fukushima. Their initial results, detailed in the PNAS paper indicate that the combined amount of radioactive material from the damaged power plant constitutes the largest accidental release of radiation to the ocean in history.

Despite this, analysis of samples from the study site show that the amount of radiation in the ocean fell well below EPA standards that would deem it unsafe to use as drinking water. “We knew that the radionuclides had to be moving off shore very rapidly once they entered the water,” said Buesseler. “Once they did, they quickly dispersed across a wide area and began mixing into the deeper layers of the ocean.”

Jun Nishikawa (left, Univ. Tokyo) and Hannes Baumann (right, SUNY Stony Brook) retrieve a net to the stern of the R/V Ka'imikai-O-Kanaloa in June 2011 off the northeast coast of Japan. The crew made more than 100 net tows of various size during the cruise to sample organisms ranging from small fish to phytoplankton. (Ken Kostel, Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution)

In addition, they found that concentrations of cesium isotopes varied widely from station to station. Data from the drifters helped shed more light on this. First, the region is dominated by the Kuroshio, a large, fast current much like the Gulf Stream that flows north near the coast of Japan before turning east along the shore of the Chiba Peninsula. At the same time, a smaller, nutrient-rich current known as the Oyashio flows south along the northeast coast and mixes with the Kuroshio offshore from Fukushima.

“Having two strong currents in the region make this a very complex part of the ocean to study,” said Jayne, who had studied the region in the past. “It also makes this a very productive part of the ocean and a very active fishery. With all that water moving around in complex ways, areas that are low one day could be high the next.

As if to underscore that complexity, the group found that the Kuroshio acted as a barrier that prevented the movement of radionuclides to the south. In addition, they found the highest levels of radiation not in samples taken within sight of the reactors, but in those taken much further south along the coast of Ibaraki. The drifter tracks later revealed that an eddy, a swirling mass of water that sometimes breaks off from strong currents like the Kuroshio, had formed in the area and hugged the coast, likely drawing in contaminated water and maintaining higher concentrations of radionuclides.

As a result, radiation levels in the eddy were as much as 1,000 times higher than those before the start of the accident, but these remained well below levels of concern for humans and marine organisms and were approximately one-sixth the level of radiation that marine organisms receive from naturally occurring radionuclides such as potassium-40.

Samples of plankton and small fish confirmed this. Levels of cesium isotopes and another, faster-decaying isotope of silver found in the organisms collected during the cruise ranged from below detection level to levels that, while elevated, remained within standards set for human consumption.

“The radioactivity of the fish we caught and analyzed would not pose problems for human consumption,” said Fisher. “It does not mean all marine organisms caught in the region are perfectly safe to eat. That’s still an open question. There are still likely to be hot spots in sediments close to shore and closer to the power plant that may have resulted in very contaminated species in those areas. Further study and appropriate monitoring will help clarify this issue.”

Human and natural sources of radioactive isotopes in the ocean. NOTE: colored ovals not drawn to scale. (Illustration by Jack Cook, courtesy of the Coastal Ocean Institute, Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution)

Another open question is why radiation levels in the waters around Fukushima have not decreased since the Japanese stopped emergency cooling operations. According to Buesseler, it may be an indication that the ground surrounding the reactors has become saturated with contaminated water that is slowly seeping out in to the ocean. It may also be a sign that radionuclides in ocean sediments have become remobilized.

“What this means for the marine environment of the Northwest Pacific over the long-term is something that we need to keep our eyes on,” said Buesseler.

The following is a video update on the drillship Chikyu’s preparation to depart on this scientific endeavor.

Click here to view the embedded video.

RV Southern Surveyor, image courtesy Nautilus Minerals

(University of Sydney)  In the remote waters of the Indian Ocean, west of Perth, scientists have just discovered two sunken islands, almost the size of Tasmania, which were once part of the supercontinent Gondwana.

“The data collected on the voyage could significantly change our understanding of the way in which India, Australia and Antarctica broke off from Gondwana,” said Dr Joanne Whittaker, a postdoctoral fellow at the University of Sydney’s School of Geosciences.

Researchers from the University of Sydney, Macquarie University and the University of Tasmania led an international team of scientists on the voyage to map the seafloor of the Perth Abyssal Plain. The expedition returned to Perth last week after a three-week cruise.

Traveling on the CSIRO vessel Southern Surveyor the scientists discovered the islands through detailed seafloor mapping and by dredging rock samples from the steep slopes of the two islands, now in water depths of over 1.5km.

“The sunken islands charted during the expedition have flat tops, which indicates they were once at sea level before being gradually submerged,” said Dr Whittaker.

Rocks from the abyss more than 1.5 km below the surface, image courtesy University of Sydney

Collecting rocks from the abyss more than 1.5km below the surface was not easy, but the geologists managed to retrieve hundreds of kilograms and unexpectedly found rocks that showed the islands had not always been underwater.

The University of Sydney’s Dr Simon Williams, the chief scientist on the expedition said: “We expected to see common oceanic rocks such as basalt in the dredge, but were surprised to see continental rocks such as granite, gneiss and sandstone containing fossils.”

In the Cretaceous period when dinosaurs roamed the Earth (more than 130 million years ago), India was adjacent to Western Australia. When India began to break away from Australia, the islands formed part of the last link between the two continents.

Eventually these islands, referred to as ‘micro-continents’ by scientists, were separated from both landmasses and stranded in the Indian Ocean, thousands of kilometres from the Australian and Indian coasts.

Dr Williams commented: “A detailed analysis of the rocks dredged up during the voyage will tell us about their age and how they fit into the Gondwana jigsaw.”

- University of Sydney

Sophisticated instruments were put to use…

Helping the scientists to acquire this data was the suite of Kongsberg Maritime hydroacoustic sensors and systems aboard the RV Southern Surveyor, which included:

• Simrad EK60 scientific echo sounder
• Simrad EK500 scientific echo sounder
• KONGSBERG EA 500 hydrographic echo sounder
• KONGSBERG EM 300 multibeam hydrographic echo sounder
• KONGSBERG PS 018 Sub-bottom profiler

Travelling on RV Southern Surveyor the scientists discovered the islands through detailed seafloor mapping using the EM 300 multibeam system and by the challenging collection of rocks from the abyss more than 1.5 km below the surface.

What is a multibeam hydrographic echo sounder you ask?  Check out this video from Kongsberg…

Click here to view the embedded video.

You would have thought a disaster like this would have made the national news. But no one was hurt, and there is no legal requirement for shipping companies to report such losses. No government officials knew about this debacle except perhaps a few customs inspectors.

Following up on MBARI’s discovery, sanctuary staff investigated the potential for recovering the other missing 14 containers. However, they soon discovered that it was unlikely that the additional containers would ever be located, and the cost and time involved in recovering them would have been prohibitive. On July 26, 2006, after a significant legal effort, the shipping company agreed to pay the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration $3.25 million to settle claims relating to the lost containers. Money from this settlement is being used to fund the upcoming research dives.

Leading the dives are Andrew DeVogelaere, research coordinator at the MBNMS, and James Barry, a senior scientist at MBARI. Using MBARI’s research vessel Western Flyer and the remotely operated vehicle Doc Ricketts, the team will take a close look at the container itself, as well as the seafloor around the container.

Marine biologists will count the number of deep-sea animals on and around the container, and collect samples of sediment at various distances from the container for biological and chemical analysis. By comparing animal communities close to and away from the container, the researchers hope to determine what effects (if any) the container has had on seafloor life.

According to the U.S. Customs manifest, the container discovered by MBARI holds 1,159 steel-belted tires. Other containers that fell overboard held cyclone fencing, leather chairs, and mattress pads.

This motley list underscores the fact that much of the everyday merchandise we buy in stores has been shipped to the U.S. by container ship. Approximately 90 percent of worldwide non-bulk cargo travels by container ship, and between five and six million containers are in transit at any given moment. To make matters worse, not all container cargo is inert. Perhaps 10 percent of shipping containers carry household and industrial chemicals that could be toxic to marine life.

Over the last five years, the number of containers lost at sea has increased dramatically. This trend is likely to continue as new container ships are being built twice as large as existing ones. Yet tie-down technology and lax monitoring of container weights and stacking procedures have not changed significantly.

The upcoming expedition will provide a snapshot of what is essentially a worldwide problem. When shipping containers are lost at sea, they endanger other craft, cost considerable time and money, and sometimes pose hazards to marine life. According to DeVogelaere, “As these containers drop to the bottom of the sea, they form deep-water stepping stones between ports, highways of debris, if you will. I hope that this cruise will help expand the public’s thinking about human impacts in the deep sea.”

Image: This shipping container was discovered upside down on the seafloor by MBARI researchers in June 2004, four months after it was lost at sea. Researchers will revisit this site during the upcoming cruise. Image: © 2004 MBARI

Rolls-Royce has a growing presence in the subsea and seismic technology markets, and during the last three months, inclusive of this contract, the Group has secured seismic orders totalling more than £50 million.

Cato Fjeldstad, Rolls-Royce, Sales Manager – Special Purpose Vessels, said “Rolls-Royce has decades of experience in designing specialist vessels to meet the needs of the oil and gas industry and continues to develop industry leading technology. Our expertise enables our customers to meet their objectives safely and efficiently, while operating in some of the most challenging environments on earth.”

The vessel, a UT 830 CD, will be able to operate worldwide and will be the first of its type to be equipped with a package of Rolls-Royce handling systems for seismic equipment.

During research missions, the vessel will tow up to 14 cables, or ‘streamers’, each 10 kilometres long. Seismic waves are sent deep into the seabed and the reflected waves are detected by hydrophones spread along the network of streamers. This data is then used to give a detailed 3D profile of the geological features, including the location of oil and gas, often thousands of meters below sea level.

Conducting seismic research requires a powerful and stable vessel, which provides extensive endurance, with enough stores and fuel for 70 days at sea. Seismic surveys involve criss-crossing large sections of the seabed, at low speed, often requiring several weeks of continuous operation.

Shanghai Shipyard Co will build the vessel for Shanghai Offshore Petroleum Geophysical Corporation (part of the Sinopec organisation), with delivery scheduled for 2013.

Photo: NVC 830 CD is a modern seismic research vessel courtesy Rolls-Royce

More than three decades ago, marine scientists in the United States first identified the need for a research vessel capable of bringing scientists to Alaska’s icy northern waters.

The University of Alaska Fairbanks has announced its intent to award a $123 million contract that will meet that need. The university has selected Marinette Marine Corporation of Marinette, Wis. to build the 254-foot Alaska Region Research Vessel. When complete, the vessel will be one of the most advanced university research vessels in the world and will be capable of breaking ice up to 2.5 feet thick. According to project leaders, the ARRV’s home port will be in Alaska, most likely at UAF’s Seward Marine Center.

The $123 million for the ship construction contract is funded entirely by the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act. The total cost for the project is $200 million.

The vessel will be owned by the National Science Foundation and operated by UAF as part of the U.S. academic research fleet. It will be used by scientists in the U.S. and international oceanographic community through the University-National Oceanographic Laboratory System. The vessel was designed by The Glosten Associates, a marine architecture firm in Seattle.

After the ship has been completed, the crew will take the vessel from the shipyard through the Great Lakes-St. Lawrence Seaway transit system and the Panama Canal to Alaska in 2013. While in transit, scientists and crewmembers will test the scientific components of the ship in preparation for unrestricted science operations beginning in 2014.

The most technologically advanced drillship in the world is not on lovaton in the gulf of mexico or in a Korean shipyard. Actually it’s not even built yet. Meet the Aurora Borealis, a dynamically positioned, drillship/icebreaker, arctic research vessel designed for the European Union. The official website tells us;

The Research Icebreaker AURORA BOREALIS will be the most advanced Polar Research Vessel in the world with a multi-functional role of drilling in deep ocean basins and supporting climate/environmental research for the next 40 years.

The new technological features will include azimuth propulsion systems, satellite navigation, ice-management support, deep-sea drilling under a closed sea-ice cover and the deployment and operation of Remotely Operated Vehicles (ROV) and Autonomous Underwater Vehicles (AUV) from one of the two moon-pools.

The unique feature of the vessel is the drilling rig, which will enable sampling of the ocean floor down to 5000 m water depth and with 1000 m penetration into the seafloor at the most inhospitable places on earth. The drilling capability will be deployed in both polar regions and AURORA BOREALIS will be the only vessel worldwide to undertake this type of scientific investigation.

Technical Details:

• Powerful icebreaker with ca. 55 MW (diesel-electric)
• Highest classification for icebreakers
• Twin hull
• Two moon pools 7 x 7 m each
• Dynamic Positioning System
• Deep-sea drilling under a closed sea-ice cover
• Drilling rig: max. 5,000 m water depth and 1,000 m core
• Riserless drilling technology
• Modularized mobile laboratory systems – mission specific laboratories
Length over all ca. 180 m | Beam ca. 40 m | Personnel (crew + scientists) 120 | Expedition duration 60 days.

For more information on the Aurora Borealis visit the official website HERE or download the presentation HERE. For the oceanography geeks a more detailed study can be found HERE.

UPDATE: The BBC has just run an excellent article on this vessel which can be found HERE.

Note: This article was originally posted in Jan 08

Photo of the research boat Russell W. Peterson takes on water about 14 miles off the coast of Rehoboth Beach, Del., Monday, May 12, 2008. Video of this incident can be found HERE.

Via H&K Law

Brief History of Argo

The name Argo was chosen to emphasize the strong complementary relationship of the global float array with the Jason satellite altimeter mission. In Greek mythology Jason sailed in a ship called “Argo” to capture the golden fleece.

An Argo float being deployed from a research ship.

Together the Argo and Jason data sets will be assimilated into computer models developed by project GODAE (Global Ocean Data Assimilation Experiment) that will allow a test of our ability to forecast ocean climate. For the first time, the physical state of the upper ocean is being systematically measured and the data assimilated in near real-time into computer models. Argo builds on other upper-ocean ocean observing networks, extending their coverage in space an time, their depth range and accuracy, and enhancing them through the addition of salinity and velocity measurements. Argo is not confined to major shipping routes which can vary with season as the other upper-ocean observing networks are. Instead, the global array of 3,000 floats will be distributed roughly every 3 degrees (300km).

Comprised of three subsystems: Hydraulics: control buoyancy adjustment via an inflatable external bladder, so the float can surface and dive. Microprocessors: deal with function control and scheduling. Data transmission system: controls communication with satellite. Approx. Weight: 25 Kg Max. operating depth: 2000m Crush depth: 2600m

The three float models in use are the PROVOR built by MARTEC in France in close collaboration with IFREMER, the APEX float produced by Webb Research Corporation, USA and the SOLO float designed and built by Scripps Institution of Oceanography, USA.

You can find more details at Argo’s website, here.

Related Seattle Times article, here.

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This post was written by Richard Rodriguez, Rescue Tug Captain, and US Coast Guard approved instructor for License Training. You can read more of his articles at the BitterEnd of the net.