DMS Miniboat Update

The original crew has been working hard this past week to get ANITA ready for another journey. Our emails have been answered, and the crew of the Neil Armstrong has agreed to take her out with them. The newest 5th grade crew members (pictured up front) have been making predictions about where they think ANITA may land.

We met Glen Gawarkiewicz on Friday at the security station nearest to the Neil Armstrong. Security was tight due to there being so many ships at the docks. Glen explained to us in the dry lab what their plans were for work on the journey. They are planning on leaving food along the bottom for shark monitoring, catching and dissecting squid (in the wet lab) and inspecting phytoplankton. We had installed a new solar panel prior to the trip, and it was already sending back signals from the sensors. Our crew was packing cargo in the hatch and sealing ANITA up tight.

Our first job was to repaint her hull and keel with antifouling paint. Some had been scraped off in the previous trips, and we wanted to make sure she had layers of protection. We then gathered our cargo items. Mrs. Winans, our previous music teacher and faculty member at the elementary schools was able to vacuum seal most of our items. This creates less of a chance of water ruining them.

Our friends at the Crawford Library in Dudley have been such supports of our project and gave us a library card to include with the cargo. We were also able to secure a couple Dudley Police badges from our school resource officer, Officer Tyler Smith. You'll also notice our "Message in a bottle" book, where the finders of ANITA can meet our crew and see some of our landing predictions.

We're hoping to hear that ANITA is deployed on Monday. Please use the link below to follow the Neil Armstrong out into the ocean. We will be back in touch once we have more information.

Our main GPS unit was charged, but not sending back signals to Cassie on Friday. We had to make a plan on the fly and Daryn went down to Falmouth to add a second GPS unit on ANITA's deck. THANK YOU Daryn!

DRY LAB: a laboratory for making computer simulations or for data analysis by computers

SECURITY: the quality or state of being secure

WET LAB: a laboratory equipped with appropriate plumbing, ventilation, and equipment to allow for hands-on scientific research and experimentation