Halloween on the Brown
Happy Halloween, everyone! We here on the Ronald Brown are getting into the Halloween spirit. The PMEL and LIDAR research groups have disappeared and pirates have taken their place. The shrill battle cry of "Arrrgh!" echoed across the mess deck during lunch. The ship's lounge has been decorated with spider webs and pumpkins and I'm even told that there will be trick-or-treat candy available if you knock on the doors of some of the research containers on weather decks of the Ronald Brown.
The cheerful Halloween spirit of the scientists and crew even managed to work into the atmospheric observations. The balloon for one of today's upper-air measurements was replaced with the Great Pumpkin to spread Halloween cheer. In the picture that goes with this post card you can see Lelia Hawkins in her pirate costume and Dan Wolfe inflating the pumpkin balloon. Lelia drew the pumpkin design on the balloon while it was uninflated, and the balloon drew a large audience. The radiosonde attached to the pumpkin balloon reached a maximum height of 23,464 meters at 31.7 millibars, which was an above average performance for the balloon soundings to date for the VOCALS campaign.
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