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TRYING TO GO AGAINST THE FLOW Mission Dispatch 5 - April 8, 2005 | Mark Schrope - @SEA Correspondent Elbow Cay, Cay Sal Bank 
This morning, just after the submersible went in, a group of us took
a small boat in to dive another section of the wall that skirts the entire
line of rocky islets here. As soon as we made it to the bottom at 85 feet,
just inside from the wall, a small reef shark greeted us. After fiddling
with the settings on the camera, I looked up to see that he had decided to
make a closer pass, maybe a little too close, but he was only about
three or four feet long. I got one decent shot then fought against the current
to get into a gulley the rest of the divers had entered.
The wall was spectacular, covered with all manner of healthy growth and plenty of fish. The gulley there was welcome terrain as it allowed us to avoid the brunt of the current so the scientists could gather sponges more easily. It included a tunnel we entered at about 120 feet and emerged from at about 90 feet. Some of the divers also ventured out to the face of the wall to work. Shirley Pomponi spotted a sponge she needed to get that the group has been studying for many years. John Reed 
came along to snap a photo of the specimen and as Shirley describes it, the
current picked up some, John gently blew away, and she had to drag herself
back to get the sponge. "I was holding onto it for dear life because I didn't
want to lose it," she says, once she made the collection.
She had no chance to grab a sample bag, so she held the sponge in hand and made her way back into the tunnel. There she found another species she needed, so she emerged at the top with her hands full. As with all deep dives using compressed air, it was over far too quickly. We had to return to the surface after just 19 minutes or so to avoid decompression sickness. TO THE RUINS 
Later in the day, we were back near the main island and took one boat in for
snorkeling and a second for a brief shore excursion to check out
the ruins. There is no beach to speak of, so we just anchored in a tiny bay
and swam. The lighthouse is rickety to say the least, which is not
surprising given that it's been taking on the storms here for more than
150 years. Inside we could see bits of clothing and some cooking
implements, most likely signs of Cuban refugees who ended up here while
trying to make it to Florida.
There were also a number of crumbling buildings and a large cistern. Near the steepest edge of the island we found several large blowholes, and in some you could see pools of saltwater and hear the wave action. These were the tunnels we had heard about, but there was no time on this trip to snorkel through them. Based on the account we read, there could even be interesting sponges in the tunnels to collect. Maybe tomorrow. MORE STRANGE SUB FINDS 
Both submersible dives today targeted features similar to those explored
by Shirley and Don Liberatore yesterday. Amy was up front in the morning
and found a number of interesting gorgonians -- soft corals also known as sea
fans-- for study. One was of a type never before encountered by
Harbor Branch. John Reed, our coral expert, was especially excited by
the strange specimen, which is similar to one found off Nova Scotia.
Shirley and Phil were up front for the afternoon dive to about 1,700 feet. The features they searched during the dive were covered with small, white lithistid sponges. These have historically yielded a number of interesting biomedical compounds, so they collected quite a few. Another highlight of the dive was an abundance of black corals. For some reason, much of it was simply bases and stalks, with the branches broken off. SO FAR Analyses on board the ship with the wealth of samples already collected during scuba and sub dives are going well. Rough tests with extracts, which are simply samples ground up in alcohol then filtered to remove the solid pieces, have revealed a number of new chemical compounds that will be further  examined
in subsequent tests to begin to assess their pharmaceutical potential. Later in
the trip, the team will begin testing some of the extracts to see if they have
antibiotic potential, then back in the labs at Harbor Branch they will look at
anti-cancer activity.
Tomorrow, we'll be working our way to the northeast around the bend of this group of islands to see what else we can find. 
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