Secrets Haunt the Lobsters' Sea

by Charlene D'Avanzo

  “That’s the site they named ‘Clambake 1.’”

  “Correct. More dives gave them ‘Clambake 2’ and a site they called ‘Dandelion Patch.’”

  “What about the foot-plus-long tube worms?”

  “They called that one ‘Garden of Eden.’ Long white-stalked tubeworms with bright red tops. Never been seen before. Swaying in the water, they looked like a field of ted tulips. That was the warmest site, nearly room temperature.”

  “What was the reaction aboard Lulu and Knorr as all this was going on?”

  “People were dancing on the ceiling. This was an enormous Columbus-scale discovery with so many unanswered questions. The biggest one, of course, was ‘What the heck are all these creatures eating?’”

  “Too bad the media didn’t know scientists would discover a deep sea wonderland fueled by chemical energy from hot vents instead of sunlight. A whole ecosystem we never even knew existed. It could’ve been watched by millions like the Apollo moonwalk.”

  “Hello, ladies.”

  Betty and I turned in unison as Ted strolled up and dropped his backpack on the pier next to mine.

  “Betty was at WHOI when Alvin discovered the Galapagos Rift ecosystem,” I said. “First time I’ve heard the story from beginning to end.”

  “Betty, I’d love to listen to that,” he said. “Over beers at the Lee Side sometime?”

  I’d long suspected Betty had a bit of a crush on Ted. Her weathered skin didn’t hide the crusty oceanographer’s blush.

  With a quick nod she said, “Yeah, sure,” wished us good luck, and lumbered down the pier toward shore.

  Ted took Betty’s spot on the bench as several crewmembers boarded Thallassa.

  “Ready to go?” Ted asked.

  I looked down at my hands. “Before we got into deep sea vents, Betty brought up something you and I should talk about.”

  “Good for her. I’ve been thinking about this but figured I’d follow your lead.”

  I bit my lip. “Betty reminded me I don’t have to go down. If, you know, I get a panic attack.”

  As Ted put his hand on my knee, his navy eyes signaled compassion and understanding “Of course, you don’t. Benthic Pioneer has a terrific camera system. You’d see everything from the ship, and we can talk the whole time I’m on the bottom if you want.”

  We were discussing my very private struggle in a very public setting, and I felt exposed. I slid away from him a bit

  Reaching down for my backpack, I lifted it onto my shoulder. “Really appreciate you saying that. It takes the pressure off. Naturally, I’d love to see deep-sea corals up close, but it’s good to know there’s a backup plan.”

  “If you decide to go for it, let me know if you need a little more time before you get into the sub, that type of thing. Believe me, you won’t be the first scientist who got the heebie-jeebies as they dropped into a submersible.”

  We boarded the ship talking about the origin of “heebie-jeebies.”

  “I think it was coined in the nineteen twenties when nonsense rhyming pairs got popular,” Ted said.

  “Like the bees knees,” I added.

  Anyone listening to us could not have imagined that we’d just discussed how I, daughter of two oceanographers who’d died in a submersible, might react to my first dive in one.

  Thalassa’s captain was in the bridge. Ted, who’d met him before, introduced us. Completely bald, the man made up for his lack of hair with a neatly trimmed white beard and mustache.

  He gave my hand one quick shake. “Delighted to have you on board Dr. Tusconi.”

  “Please call me Mara. For a marine biologist, seeing the Gulf of Maine’s hanging coral gardens up close is an opportunity of a lifetime. Um, when will we reach our station, do you think?”

  “Late morning, maybe noon.”

  “And Benthic Pioneer’s tender is already there.”

  He glanced at the electronic array in front of him. “Yes. They’ve gone down twice already. Your dive will be the last one before Ocean Voyager heads south to Woods Hole.

  I wanted to ask how the dives had gone but man was clearly busy and would probably think it was an odd question anyway. I thanked him, and we left. Ted and I were out on the aft deck when Thalassa’s engines came to life. We watched as the crew cast off all lines except one on the bow. Only when the stern had swung a good distance out from the pier did the crew release the bow line.

  The captain slowly backed away, shifted to forward, and carefully maneuvered the ship out of Spruce Harbor.

  How long is Thalassa,” I asked. “Seventy-five feet?”

  “That sounds about right,” Ted said. “A lot of ship in a harbor with lobster and pleasure boats.”

  After Thalassa passed through Spruce Harbor’s headlands, we clambered down a ladder down to the mess. Ted carried a mug of coffee to a booth. I went for mint tea, and he didn’t need to ask why.

  Swirling my tea I asked, “This is the first submersible to go down to the hanging gardens?”

  “Yup. Researchers studying Maine’s deep water reefs have used real-time color video and digital photography, that type of thing.”

  “I assume subs are too expensive?”

  “It’s too bad, but they are. As you heard, Benthic Pioneer is headed back to Cape Cod. Schoodic Ridge isn’t much out of the way, so they decided to do a couple of dives there.”

  “Since you can find deep-sea corals in canyons closer to the Cape, why dive on Schoodic Ridge?”

  It took a moment for him to answer. “Um, well, the highest coral densities are on steep, vertical rock faces. Benthic Pioneer’s pilot wanted to see how the submersible operated in that type of setting.”

  My stomach flipped. “Operated?”

  “How close he could get to the rock face so we could see the corals up close.”

  I let out a long, slow breath. “Oh. I guess that makes sense.”

  We sat there for a long while as Ted sipped his coffee and I my tea.

  23

  Ocean Voyager is not your usual ship. With her oversized A-frame designed to lift a submersible in and out of the water, as we approached she looked like a huge floating mousetrap attached to a boat at the front end.

  I thanked one of Thalassa’s crewmember before we boarded Ocean Voyager and added, “What’ll you guys do while we’re busy with the submersible?”

  He answered with a wink. “When you’re done we’ll bring you home.”

  “Wow. I’m not used to such service.”

  “MOI’s publicity people told us to take good care of you. Hey, get some cool photos so we can see them on the way back. What you folks are doing is exciting stuff.”

  Ocean Voyager’s aft deck was pretty much taken up by Benthic Pioneer. The twenty-odd-foot submersible looked bigger than I’d expected. Given all its tanks, thrusters, tubing, lights, and viewports, the yellow-and-white sub was clearly an impressive piece of ocean engineering.

  When Ted announced he’d go up to the bridge and talk to the ship’s captain, I opted to stay on deck and “take in the fresh air.” He nodded, said he’d be right back, patted my shoulder, and left.

  Sucking on a piece of ginger candy, I spread my feet to better manage the rocking ship, leaned back on Ocean Voyager’s gunwale, and regarded the submersible. The cheerily colored oblong machine didn’t appear too menacing.

  “In fact,” I said aloud. “Given all your tubes, lights, tanks and what-not, you look like a fish out of water.”

  With his horn-rimmed glasses, crew cut, white T-shirt, jeans, and high-topped sneakers, I couldn’t tell if the guy who emerged from the opposite side of the sub was a scientist or a crewmember.

  He patted the submersible. “I talk to her all the time. I’m Dylan Dyer, Benthic Pioneer’s pilot.”

  “Hi,” I said. “Um, it’s pretty impressive.”

  “Ever been down in a submersible before?”

  Looking to the side I said, “No. First time.”

  I waited for him to c
ome back with “You’re going to love it” or something along that line. Instead he said, “Then why don’t I explain what’s what on Benthic Pioneer.”

  Grateful Dylan was experienced with more than piloting submersibles, I nodded. “That would be terrific.”

  He pointed to a large black cylinder secured on its side. “I can control the sub’s buoyancy by regulating air volume in that ballast tank.”

  “It looks like a huge scuba tank,” I said.

  “Yeah, but it functions like a scuba buoyancy compensator device.”

  I shook my head. “BCs are a total pain to operate.”

  “Yup. Reason number twenty-five why submersibles have it over scuba.” He gestured toward dome-shaped windows on the sub’s side and front end. “There are three viewing windows—those two smaller ones and a big one up front—the pilot and scientists can look through. They’re dome-shaped so what you’re looking at is bigger than it appears.”

  “Got it. What powers Benthic Pioneer?”

  “Six thrusters, three on each side, let us move her horizontally and vertically in the water. Let’s see. You’ll be especially interested in how we collect specimens.”

  We walked over to the sub’s fore end. “See those turquoise tubes? That’s how scientists get organisms they’re especially interested in.”

  “Damn,” I said. “All that tubing operated by robotic arms. I can’t imagine how difficult it is to coordinate.”

  He grinned. “You got that right. I’ve heard lots of swear words I never knew existed.”

  “How do you communicate with the surface?”

  “When you’re inside, you’ll see the video screen and speaker.”

  It took a moment before “when” sank it. Then I asked the big question. “What happens if, ah, the sub gets stuck?”

  “We have life support for three days—air tanks and carbon dioxide scrubbers. Water and food too.”

  I swayed as my legs nearly buckled.

  Dylan grabbed my arm, “Let’s get you sitting down.”

  He led me to large plastic storage box in front of the sub, waited as I lowered myself onto it, and sat down next to me. “We can talk about it if you want.”

  The whole thing came out in a tumble—who my parents were, what they were doing in a submersible, why they didn’t come up alive.

  “Lord almighty,” he said. “I knew about Johnson Sea Link but not what happened to your parents.”

  “The Johnson Sea Link disaster was especially gruesome because Link lost his son in the dive.”

  Dylan leaned over, elbows on his knees. “I get why you’re here, of course. For a marine biologist from Maine, seeing these deep corals up close is a dream come true. But I’ve been doing this for a while now and nobody, far as I know, has had to deal with what happened to your mom and dad.

  Frankly, I think it’s amazing you’re here at all.”

  I swallowed and waited until I could get the words out. “That’s…um. I mean, what a great thing to say. Sometimes I feel, you know, like I should just suck it up.”

  “No way.” He glanced at his dive watch. “Look, I’m going to follow your lead. You can skip the dive or try to go for it and back down. Whatever you want.”

  We stood together. “Any suggestions how I might distract myself.”

  He shrugged. “How about imagining you’re going into a space capsule? You know, for a trip to the space station or something.”

  Dylan turned and very nearly walked into a short, skinny crewmember who’d just rounded the submersible. Rotating in my direction, Dylan said, “Mara, this is Bart. He’ll be helping with the deployment.”

  Watching Dylan and Bart walk off together, I wondered why the pilot had bothered with the introduction.

  When Ted came back, Dylan went over everything from the dive schedule and routine entry and exit procedures to emergency protocol. We’d already read a manual with the same information, but it was good to hear it verbally.

  “We’ll review some of this when we’re inside the capsule,” he said. With a quick glance at me he added, “Including emergency procedures.”

  Dylan’s idea that I imagine this was on a mission to the International Space Station actually worked. Thinking about going up instead of down helped me step away from the experience, as if I were watching someone else. In this spacey state of mind, I marched down the deck toward the submersible like a veteran.

  It was only after I’d climbed up and watched Bart lift the sub’s hatch that the extraterrestrial ruse failed. I, daughter of Bridget and Carlos Tusconi, was about to enter a capsule and sink under the water.

  With a quick glace in my direction, Ted slipped down into the submersible. I was next.

  Dylan reached extended his hand and said, “Mara, I can help you.”

  Standing there atop Benthic Explorer, I froze and time slowed. Ocean Voyager lazily rocked to one side, the other, and back again. A light breeze lifted locks of hair off my forehead. Dylan spoke, but the words were drawn out and incoherent. I tried to ask what he said, but my mouth wouldn’t open.

  Seconds passed. A minute. More seconds.

  The biting voice from behind came through loud and clear. “Any time now.”

  Like someone had smacked me hard, I whirled around. Bart’s smirk screamed disdain. “Are you talking to me?” I hissed.

  It wasn’t his slouch, crossed arms, or practiced expression of boredom that almost made me feel sorry for the young crewmember. It was that his face—pale, scarred with acne, blemished with small muddy eyes—lacked anything of interest or appeal. Bart was someone you’d forget the moment you turned away from him.

  His mouth hanging open, the crewmate stared at me.

  “Bart,” I said, “There are jackasses everywhere, and I have the same contempt for them all.”

  24

  After Dylan’s review and quick tour of the submersible’s interior, Ted and I settled into half-sitting, half-lying-down positions in front of our respective viewports. A whirring noise echoed inside the capsule.

  “That’s the A-frame being lowered,” Dylan called out. “You’ll feel a bump when the crew connects us to it. Then we’ll rise up into the air, swing out over the stern, descend, and stop. At that point you’ll see the sea surface outside the viewports.”

  Seconds later, we were soaring through the air as sky rushed past the windows. High up, the sub stopped moving. Then we inched down and stopped again, the ocean just feet below the viewports.

  The whole experience deserved the moniker “awesome.” I was too amazed to be frightened.

  As Dylan communicated with his counterparts outside, I closed my eyes, slowly breathed, and mentally talked to myself. “You’ve slipped under the water dozens of times on scuba. This’ll be just like that. Then you’ll slowly descend. You’ve done that too.”

  Of course, dropping down into the ocean in a submersible wasn’t really like scuba diving at all. I’d not gone much more than a hundred feet with a scuba tank on my back. The hanging coral gardens were hundreds of feet deeper. More importantly, on scuba I was in charge and could ascend any time I wanted to. In Benthic Pioneer, I was a trapped passenger.

  “Not trapped,” I whispered. “Visiting.”

  Ted craned his neck in my direction and mouthed “Okay?”

  I gave him the thumb-to-middle-finger scuba okay signal. He grinned.

  “Here we go, folks,” Dylan announced. “They tell me it’s choppy out there. Either of you need a barf bag for the first part of the descent?”

  Ted declined. I nodded, and Dylan handed me a bright blue plastic bag with “For Sickness Cleanup” written on the side.

  Feeling like an idiot, I sat cross-legged in front of my viewport with the bag within reach. Distracted by fear, I’d forgotten to bring the patches I place behind my ear to prevent being seasick.

  The submersible was motionless for a moment. Then it dropped, made contact with the water, and rocked to and fro. A lot.

  “If you need t
o hold on, there are handles on either side and below the viewports.” Dylan said.

  Great, I thought.

  Eyes closed, I told myself the rocking would soon stop. As we slipped a few feet below the surface, I stared at the waterline that had appeared at the bottom of my window. Bile crept up into my mouth. Swallowing, I searched for something distant to focus on like I did riding in a car. But there was nothing like that in the churning blue-green sea.

  The sub descended a little further. Surely, this dreadful swaying would stop now, I thought.

  It didn’t.

  More bile crept up into my mouth. I grabbed the bag and spit it out. Ted turned from his window and tipped his head. I shrugged, and he turned back.

  Vomiting, also known as emesis and throwing up, is described as “involuntary, forceful expulsion of the contents of one’s stomach through the mouth.”

  In other words, the victim can’t stop the disgusting, smelly, totally embarrassing emptying of vomit from her gut into her mouth.

  On my knees, I grabbed the barf bag, quite audibly filled it, and panting, held the top closed.

  Like nothing in the world had happened, Dylan handed me a water bottle. “Trade you this for the bag.”

  “Really, you don’t.…” I began.

  He grinned. “Part of my job. This happens a lot.”

  What a great guy. He’d made no sarcastic comment about an oceanographer who got seasick.

  Sipping the water, I glanced out the window. We were well below the surface and the water’s fading blue-green hue told me the depth was probably thirty-odd feet. Best of all, Benthic Pioneer was slipping gracefully through the water like a gliding bird.

  “How’s everybody doing?” Dylan asked a few minutes later.

  By “everybody,” he meant me, of course.

  Staring through my viewport I said, “Good. There’s still some light out there and the amount of marine snow is amazing. How far down are we?”

  “Over a hundred feet. Yeah, I’m always surprised how much amorphous stuff floats around in seawater. Where does it come from?”

  I rolled over, faced him, and sat up. “It’s kind of like leaves and decaying matter falling from trees onto the forest floor. Fluffy bits of marine snow are food from the surface that drifts down into the dark waters below.”