Following SEA: Exploring New Ground

Exploring

new ground

By Dr. Rachel Scudder, C-220, SEA Visiting Chief Scientist

Student research contributes to understanding of Mars

As my team made our way across the flatter land toward the caldera, a crater created by the volcano that now holds water within, we were amazed by each pumice-y, speckly, and sulfuric rock, as they all looked extraordinarily unreal.�

Mariah Reinke, Environmental Studies, Hobart & William Smith Colleges

T

he newly formed island of Hunga Tonga Hunga Ha’apai has been described as a “little piece of Mars on Earth,” which is why NASA scientist Dan Slayback tagged along when SEA Semester class S-282, Sustainability in Polynesian Island Cultures and Ecosystems (SPICE), visited the island in October. By studying Hunga Tonga Hunga Ha’apai (HTHH for short), scientists at NASA’s Goddard Space Flight Center hope to better understand the erosion of cemented volcanic ash and rocks to gain insight into the geological history of Mars.

SEA Visiting Chief Scientist Rachel Scudder, C-220, filed a report on the research she and her students conducted on the island. The following is an excerpt: What we have been doing here is as close to the original explorers of old as you get in the modern day. The new island of HTHH consists of two older islands, Hunga Tonga and Hunga Ha’apai, which are thought to have originated in prehistoric times, and a connecting landform created in 2015 by an explosive underwater eruption. HTHH is unique in that it has not eroded back into the sea as expected. This presents an exciting puzzle. What is this island made of and why is it still here? With these questions in mind, we broke up our students and staff into several science mission teams: GPS, Rock, Drone, Flora, Bathymetric, and Waste Management.

The GPS Team’s goal was to establish known ground control points to allow NASA to more accurately measure the new island, and to establish a baseline against which future measurements can be calibrated.

The Rock Team had the hard job of both finding rocks for further analysis back at home and attempting some initial interpretation of the geological formations found on HTHH to better understand the eruption and the volcano’s resistance to erosion.

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Supervised by Captain Jay Amster, C-166, the Drone Team flew the ship’s quadcopter drone to obtain images for a digital elevation model. It was an important job that allowed NASA to have a better understanding of the structure and depth of the island’s ridge and gullies. This team had a blast flying over the caldera wall and capturing some stunning images and video of both the land and the sea!

Team Flora documented any growth of plant material on the island. An abundance of nesting birds made the task difficult, but the team was able to gather data and mark a plot for future research.

One of the most important goals was to get more complete measurements of the depth and structure of the surrounding seafloor to understand how the island is eroding and make it more navigable for future researchers. The Bathymetric Team used a depth sounder on the Seamans’ rescue boat to gather data.

Finally, the Waste Management Team, led by our chief anthropologist, Jeff Wescott, took on the task of cleaning up trash from HTHH. Clearly much of it had washed in from the sea as there were a LOT of fishing buoys.

While I am exhausted from the days of clambering and climbing over loose ground covered by rocks and managing so many different science projects, I find myself incredibly grateful to the amazing crew, assistant scientists, students, and staff at SEA who made this whole project possible.

It’s been an honor for SEA to work so closely with new colleagues such as Dan Slayback and Jim Garvin from NASA, Vicki Ferrini from the Lamont-Doherty Earth Observatory at Columbia University, and officials from Tonga, Fiji, and the U.S. State Department. We look forward to more discoveries and collaborations.

Clockwise from above: Sailing Intern Olivia Lord takes samples for pH measurement in the caldera lake; Assistant Scientist and Team Flora member Gabrielle (Gabo) Page, S-239, surveys plant life; Waste Management team members, left to right: Dietrich Klug, Glenn Billman, Charles (Cutter) Thompson, Prof. Jeff Wescott; samples of tephra, rock fragments ejected from the volcano.

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