A little later than we expected, but the first core has arrived and after a suitable period of rest and heating to room temperature the core was split and the serious work could begin at last. Needless to say this resulted in general mayhem and panicking as people began to realize that they really did not know quite how to use the software on the computers in the laboratory and did not know where various things were, which was suddenly essential, so our first day of work turned out to be the usual fit of craziness with more material arriving much faster can we could actually deal with it.

The only benefit of this is that our 12 hour work shift passes much more quickly than you might expect because of the steadily building pressure. Occasionally we remember to go and eat or to go and make tea or coffee to keep ourselves functioning, but the adrenaline can be quite significant. Outside as you can see in the photo, the work was also frantic with the rig crew pulling out 10 m cores at an impressive rate. A few of the cores had problems splitting or with lost material but now the drillers and us inside are settling into a routine and things are getting smooth. The good news for everyone was that the material seems somewhat more diverse and interesting than I at least had been expecting. Beautiful volcanic layers wafting in from the Philippines upwind of us towards the east being especially impressive.