US GEOTRACES Pacific Logistics Workshop

Approximately 60 representatives of the U.S. GEOTRACES community met on 22-24 April 2013 at the Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution to refine station and sampling protocols for the planned section between Peru and Tahiti scheduled for October – December 2013. The objectives of the workshop were to maximize coordination of sampling and analytical efforts, develop deck utilization plans, shipping and loading logistics, and explore data management protocols. The group resolved a critical situation in which the number of berths requires to cover all of the essential science operations at sea greatly exceed available bunks. Teams of specialists were established to assure that shipboard operations would be covered and that samples would be collected and archived for all funded projects. Station plans for the cruise were refined to provide a telescoping sampling resolution in regions of greatest anticipated gradients in the concentrations of trace elements and isotopes. The research vessel (Thompson) will be loaded in Seattle 5-7 October before steaming to Manta Ecuador where the scientific party will depart on 25 October for a two-month expedition scheduled to end just before Christmas in Tahiti.