Crew of the Okeanos Explorer navigate new at-sea dynamics in COVID’s wake

The NOAA research vessel Okeanos Explorer recently stopped by Unalaska. The crew is mapping the floor of the Bering Sea as part of Seascape Alaska, a five-month project that started in May of this year.

Currently, about half of the seafloor within U.S. waters remains unmapped, according to NOAA. That means a ship with deepwater exploration capabilities — like the Okeanos — is crucial to understanding what lies below the surface of waters beyond the coastline.

But the Okeanos crew is exploring more than just the depths of the ocean. They also have to navigate new hurdles in life at sea after the COVID-19 pandemic.

Hunter Brendel is the operations officer aboard the Okeanos. He said the ship explores the deepest parts of the ocean using state-of-the-art remotely operated vehicles (ROVs), which allow the crew to explore the ocean without human divers. The Okeanos captures footage, water samples and even living specimens from the seabed.

“Instead of hunting for submarines,” Brendel said, “we’re looking for shipwrecks, we’re looking for seeps, seamounts, any kind of cool geologic features.”

The 224-foot research vessel lived a previous life as the U.S. Naval Ship Capable, a slow-moving submarine hunter. In 2008, the ship was transferred to the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration. Today, the crew pursue a purely scientific mission.

At a seminar in Unalaska in July, Brendel spoke about his experiences aboard the Okeanos. He said the ship’s mission is essentially to head to sea and stumble onto interesting things.

“The nature of exploration is that we throw a dart at the map and say, ‘Let’s go there and look at it,’” he explained.

That approach involves a lot of time spent traveling, which means the crew has plenty of shared downtime. While most people say goodbye to their coworkers at the end of the day, the Okeanos crew see each other a little more often.

As an Okeanos crew member, Abby Letts saw firsthand how the COVID-19 pandemic changed life aboard the Okeanos.

Letts said the crew work in close quarters, where — unlike most colleagues — they stick together after hours and know each other’s lives inside and out.

“We almost never go to our home port,” she noted. “That’s different from other ships where everyone scatters and you don’t see the people that you’re working with. I think that’s the unique part of this ship: it’s difficult that we don’t go home, but it also helps tighten that bond [with your coworkers], because they’re your friends.”

The amount of time the crew spend aboard the Okeanos hinges entirely on each person’s role. Depending on their job, they can be on the ship from anywhere between a few weeks and two years.

Expedition coordinator Thomas Morrow said the ship has all kinds of amenities to keep the 48-person crew entertained. In many ways, it’s more than just a workplace — it can feel a bit like a floating apartment complex.

The forward lounge is a small room at the heart of the ship with a big TV, a few gaming consoles and a pair of well-worn guitars. This is where the crew gather for meetings, movies and relaxation.

Morrow said that having space to decompress has become especially important over the past few years.

“One of the big tangible changes is a consciousness of what wears on people,” he said. “We spend a lot of time now talking about, and thinking about, ‘How can we make sure everyone’s in the right state of mind before they go to sea?’”

The crew already spent large amounts of time together before COVID, but during the pandemic, they went for long stretches with absolutely no free time off the vessel. For about two years, the crew weren’t allowed to leave the boat while they were docked up. That’s because if too many people got sick, it would set the whole mission behind.

Now, with most pandemic-era restrictions lifted, Letts said it’s tough to re-adjust to the “normal” way of things.

“We had these big COVID bubbles where we’d go out to sea and come back into port, but we couldn’t leave the ship because we couldn’t risk anybody getting sick,” she said. “It was during those times when we had to be very tight knit, without a lot of outside interaction. Then suddenly, when all the restrictions were lifted, it was like, ‘How do I go back into the world?’”

Despite the difficulties, the crew remain adamant that safety is always the number one priority.

“All of the COVID restrictions — the testing, isolating — everyone was ready to do that for each other,” Morrow said. “Everybody understood and participated in mitigating strategies to make sure that we could all be safe and go out and do our jobs…I think it’s nice to see everyone acting in mutual self-interest together.”

That attitude is ultimately what keeps the mission afloat: caring for each other allows the Okeanos crew to share findings with the public.

“There’s no piece of science or new discovery out there that is worth a human life, ever,” said Morrow. “We are always very cautious, and we think very deliberately before we take the next step on each action.”

As for what keeps the crew motivated in tough times, it always comes back to the people on board.

“You get to know people in the highest of highs and the lowest of lows because that’s what being out at sea is,” Letts explained. “It’s incredibly challenging but incredibly rewarding, and I think that naturally brings people together.”

The Okeanos’ missions, including the Seascape Alaska project, are live-streamed for the public. Organic samples collected from the seabed are preserved in the Smithsonian archives.

The research vessel is scheduled to arrive in Kodiak on Aug. 17. They’ll stay there for about a week before sailing to Seward. Next exploration season, the crew will head to Hawaii and the Pacific Islands.