This morning we woke at 7:00 am, sleeping in a bit later than our normal wake-up time. Bill and I ate a quick breakfast (coffee, fruit bars and fruit) and started to get suited for a 7:30 departure on our first dive of the day. The first task was to collect the 3 water specimens for the water analysis experiment. We brought the samples back to Aquarius and dropped them off so they could be filtered and put on ice. We then proceeded to the NE excursion line and deployed a reel line to the NW to continue the communication DTO that we had started earlier in the mission. The visibility was not as good today as it had been yesterday and as we proceeded down the tether line we lost site of the habitat within 25 meters. By 8:40 we had returned to the habitat to get ready for the educational outreach event involving a number of different schools including Marc Garneau Collegiate Institute in Toronto. Ryan did an outstanding job getting set up for the event. Bill and I were scheduled to be inside the habitat to answer questions from the students and Mike G. and Mike L.A. were outside available to answer questions as well.

After we finished the outreach event we were ready for lunch. Today we had tortillas with cheese melted between them, dried fruit, applesauce and Gatorade. The afternoon was spent on the crew photos and completing the environmental monitoring DTO to measure noise levels in different parts of the habitat. Subjectively, the habitat is very quiet and the noise measurements confirmed our initial impressions. In fact, when we are lying in bed at night we can often hear the transmitted sounds from the reef through the hull of the habitat as we fall asleep.

Our timeline included crew rest in the late afternoon before our team meeting. We needed the rest to prepare for a night dive that was scheduled from 7:30 to 9:30 this evening. We ate dinner while we went through our team videoconference to complete the daily planning for tomorrow. At 7:00 pm we started suiting for the dive and carefully checked all of our equipment and lights before starting our briefing. At 7:30 we started the dive with the 4 aquanauts from our team joined by three divers (Mark, Monika and Tim) from our surface support team. Each diver had a luminescent marker attached to the back of their tank in addition to a primary dive light with an secondary dive light in the pouch of our diving harness. As the group swam out the excursion line we could look back and see the long line of divers extending back into the darkness illuminated only by their dive lights and tank markers. The bioluminescent plankton were stimulated by our motion through the water sending clouds of shimmering lights around each of the divers. The beauty was more spectacular when we turned off our dive lights and let our eyes adapt to the dark.

We proceeded down the SE excursion line to the pinnacle and enjoyed the view of the reef at night. There was a large lobster caught in the beam of my light that scuttled off to a coral head to hide. We scanned the misty darkness to look for signs of bigger fish but did not see anything new or different than what we had seen during the daytime. After refilling our tanks at the pinnacle way station Bill and I started back along the excursion line to the habitat. About half way back we attached a luminescent marker to the excursion line and used our tether reel to go and explore the adjacent reef. With our lights off we looked out at the marine life surrounding us and upwards at our bubbles trailing a bioluminescent wake as they headed to the surface; for us a forbidden place. It was truly a memorable experience, as most night dives are, and as our tank pressure dropped to 1500 psi we headed back to the habitat. That gave us time enough to collect one last water specimen before finishing our dive.

Tonight we will have pleasant dreams recounting our night dive to the reef. Imagine dreaming of flying in space and floating underwater all in one night!