February 17, 2023

I am a participant for the JR Academy traveling from Ellensburg, WA where I am a senior at Central Washington University. I am currently on day 5 out to sea during the JOIDES Resolution transit from Heraklion, Greece to Tarragona, Spain and I am enjoying every second of it!

When I got accepted into the JR academy, I was ecstatic! I couldn’t believe that I would be sailing on the famous JOIDES Resolution. I didn’t know the specifics on what we would be doing on the ship but in broad terms I knew that it was going to focus on ocean floor drilling, geology, and science communication. Albeit, I was ready for this new experience.

Day 5 was a very exciting day. We finally went into the core lab! We started our tour with a walkthrough on how the archive core gets processed after it’s been split and separated from the working half. They take it over to this machine that photographs the core in a very high resolution. These photos will be made public after a year to allow anyone interested in studying the core. The core is then tested on another machine for cavities, magnetism and even the true color of the core’s surface. After that, we got into paleomagnetism and learned how it’s used for dating by looking at the mineral orientation based on the switching of the earth’s magnetic field. Really cool stuff if you ask me.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Our afternoon was also really interesting because we learned about making children science books and I also found out that one of the outreach leaders is an actual author of multiple children books! (This was my first time meeting an author so that was cool.) We then went into the history of ocean drilling and learned a lot about the JR. Ocean drilling has a great history and I can’t wait to see what else they can accomplish. Hopefully I can be a part of that in future as either a tech or a scientist! We finished the night with a special party for Hump Day which celebrates the completion of half of our transit. It was a great party and a big thanks to DJ Dolomite for playing Trippin Pipe ( A song that represents JR drilling operations) – what a great way to end the day.

 

 

I am so grateful for this opportunity and I will cherish this experience for a long time to come. I hope to come back to the JR and work here after completing my undergraduates degree, but for now keep on trippin pipes JR.

Philip Siguenza