{"id":396,"date":"2013-02-07T16:17:32","date_gmt":"2013-02-07T16:17:32","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.oceanblogs.org\/KOSMOS2013\/?p=396"},"modified":"2013-09-05T14:48:23","modified_gmt":"2013-09-05T14:48:23","slug":"schiffe-versenken","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.oceanblogs.org\/KOSMOS2013\/2013\/02\/07\/schiffe-versenken\/","title":{"rendered":"&#8220;Schiffe versenken&#8221;"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>As a child I used to play \u201cSchiffe versenken\u201d. I think in English it\u2019s called \u201cplay battleships\u201d. This was all just on a piece of paper. It was also <i>just on a piece of paper<\/i> when Jan introduced an idea to me which he and Lennart had come up with: Sink our mesocosms. What a crazy concept! The mesocosms were made to float. Sinking them sounded like committing a massacre. But on second thought the idea become somewhat less crazy. We are in need of protecting our floating giant test tubes from damage by drifting ice floes. Not an easy task given the strong surface currents we are experiencing in the Gullmar Fjord. Once the ice starts drifting, it develops incredible forces. Wouldn\u2019t our giant babies be much safer under the ice?<\/p>\n<div id=\"attachment_145\" style=\"width: 137px\" class=\"wp-caption alignright\"><a href=\"http:\/\/www.oceanblogs.org\/KOSMOS2013\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/5\/2013\/08\/Anchor_weights_low.jpg\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" aria-describedby=\"caption-attachment-145\" class=\"size-medium wp-image-145 \" alt=\"Anchor_weights_low\" src=\"http:\/\/www.oceanblogs.org\/KOSMOS2013\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/5\/2013\/08\/Anchor_weights_low-225x300.jpg\" width=\"127\" height=\"170\" srcset=\"https:\/\/www.oceanblogs.org\/KOSMOS2013\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/5\/2013\/08\/Anchor_weights_low-225x300.jpg 225w, https:\/\/www.oceanblogs.org\/KOSMOS2013\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/5\/2013\/08\/Anchor_weights_low.jpg 709w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 127px) 100vw, 127px\" \/><\/a><p id=\"caption-attachment-145\" class=\"wp-caption-text\">Anchor weights ready for deployment<\/p><\/div>\n<p>Well then, why not sink the mesocosms. The drawing Jan had prepared to explain how to sink them looked daring. When he started explaining it, it only got worse. It took us two days of discussions and weighing the pros and cons before most of us felt comfortable that it was doable. The next step was going shopping: Jan toured the hardware stores and mountaineer shops in the area to get hundreds of meters of extra ropes, shekels, and some high-tech clamps. Matias contacted the Swedish railway company to inquire about railway wheels for sale. Andrea phoned various shipyards and junk dealers in search for disused anchors or scrap metal &#8211; we needed seven anchor weights of at least 300 kg each. At the end we decided to use some railway wheels stored at GEOMAR\u2019s logistics centre in Kiel, which Mario delivered in Kristineberg the next day.<\/p>\n<p>What followed were three days of frantic preparations to get ready for \u201csinking the mesocosms\u201d. The railway wheels were transported out to the mesocosms on the side of Wassermann and lowered to their position at the sea floor very carefully. Pulley tackles were connected. Buoys were taken out and anchoring ropes shortened. Lots of hard work for everyone involved, in particular Jan, the man in charge, and his team of divers, Michael, Matthias and Matze. At the end of all this, from a bird\u2019s view our mesocosm set-up doesn\u2019t look much different. But underneath the surface is a system that will make them dive under if needed.<\/p>\n<div style=\"width: 206px\" class=\"wp-caption alignleft\"><a href=\"http:\/\/www.oceanblogs.org\/KOSMOS2013\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/5\/2013\/08\/Jan@KOSMOS_low.jpg\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" alt=\"Jan@KOSMOS_low\" src=\"http:\/\/www.oceanblogs.org\/KOSMOS2013\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/5\/2013\/08\/Jan@KOSMOS_low-300x225.jpg\" width=\"196\" height=\"147\" \/><\/a><p class=\"wp-caption-text\">WASSERMANN breaking the ice<\/p><\/div>\n<p>Now we are anxiously watching the weather forecast. Freezing temperatures for at least another week. Right now the north-easterly winds are strong enough to prevent new ice formation. It\u2019s predicted to stay like this for at least another few days. Let\u2019s hope we don\u2019t need to play \u201cSchiffe versenken\u201d after all.<\/p>\n<p>By Ulf Riebesell<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>As a child I used to play \u201cSchiffe versenken\u201d. I think in English it\u2019s called \u201cplay battleships\u201d. This was all just on a piece of paper. It was also just on a piece of paper when Jan introduced an idea to me which he and Lennart had come up with: Sink our mesocosms. What a [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":11,"featured_media":82,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-396","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-uncategorized"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.oceanblogs.org\/KOSMOS2013\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/396","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.oceanblogs.org\/KOSMOS2013\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.oceanblogs.org\/KOSMOS2013\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.oceanblogs.org\/KOSMOS2013\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/11"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.oceanblogs.org\/KOSMOS2013\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=396"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/www.oceanblogs.org\/KOSMOS2013\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/396\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":397,"href":"https:\/\/www.oceanblogs.org\/KOSMOS2013\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/396\/revisions\/397"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.oceanblogs.org\/KOSMOS2013\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/82"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.oceanblogs.org\/KOSMOS2013\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=396"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.oceanblogs.org\/KOSMOS2013\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=396"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.oceanblogs.org\/KOSMOS2013\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=396"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}