Exploring Alaskan seamounts
Marine geologist dives to the ocean bottom to investigate undersea mountains
By Sonya Senkowsky

ABOARD R.V. ATLANTIS, GULF OF ALASKA — After days of gray skies and seas rough enough to pitch science crew members from their bunks, we half expect the first scheduled dive of the submersible Alvin to be canceled.

But as dive day dawns, 200 miles south of Kodiak, Alaska, the ocean is relatively calm and the sky is blue and clear. Shortly after 7 a.m. on June 26, 2002, OSU marine geologist Randall Keller, ’90, ’96, gets the word. His dive is on.

One of two scientists scheduled to travel today in the three-person research vessel, Keller will lead the day’s mission, the first of a two-week expedition into the deep unknown.

The trip aboard Alvin, a 23-foot-long high-tech mini submarine world-famous for its role in finding the Titanic, will take him 1.6 miles beneath the waves to a never-before explored underwater volcano known as Murray Seamount.

If all goes well, it also will be the start of a journey through time for Keller, who hopes to retrieve geological clues from this and others in a chain of Alaska seamounts that will help scientists understand how and why such undersea mountains are formed.