Mike Vardaro

I get that the news cycle is packed right now, but I just heard from a colleague at the Smithsonian that this is fully a GIANT SQUID BEING EATEN BY A SPERM WHALE and it’s possibly the first ever confirmed video according to a friend at NOAA

10 YEAR OLD ME IS LOSING HER MIND (a thread 🧵)

ROV video of an absolute mob of sablefish (black cod) swirling around the OOI-RCA benthic experiment package (BEP) at our Oregon Offshore site, about 40 miles offshore and 582 m deep. The yellow frame contains 8 different cabled oceanographic sensors. Credit: UW/NSF-OOI/WHOI, J2-1741, V25 🌊🧪🚢

A lava swirl formed and frozen in place during a previous Axial eruption

A fuzzy spider crab (minus one leg) was intrigued by the ROV and posed for a photo.

A deep-sea octopus resting on some jumbled basalt, next to a bacterial mat.

Pillars holding up a "roof" of basalt, formed by a pool of lava that slowly drained away, leaving "bathtub rings" and a hollow chamber behind.

The UW-RCA group just spent about a week turning OOI equipment at Axial Seamount, an active volcano about 200 miles off the Oregon coast. The seafloor in the caldera is covered with fantastic basalt formations, hydrothermal flows, and unique biological communities. 🌊🧪🚢

The Jason ROV being brought back aboard the Atlantis at dawn following dive J2-1725. Credit: M. Vardaro, University of Washington, V25.

The high definition video camera as seen from Jason imaging the Mushroom hydrothermal vent in ASHES. Credit: UW/NSF-OOI/WHOI; J2-1728, V25.

A high-temperature probe sticking out of a small hydrothermal chimney at Tiny Towers, a vent in the International District vent field. Credit: UW/NSF-OOI/WHOI; J2-1729, V25.

Sunset over the Pacific, as seen from the R/V Atlantis above Axial Seamount. Credit: M. Vardaro, University of Washington, V25.

The OOI-RCA cruise has been conducting multiple dives at Axial Seamount (an underwater volcano off the Oregon coast), including deployments at several different hydrothermal vent fields. The weather has been excellent for ROV operations - hopefully that will hold for the next few days!

Two sea slugs (possibly Hermissenda opalescens, also known as the opalescent nudibranch) crawling on the side of the Axial Base Shallow Profiler (200 meters depth). Credit: NSF-OOI/UW/WHOI; Dive J2-1702; V25

Spectacular feather stars, urchins, brittle stars, and scallops colonize the Shallow Platform at 200 m water depth at the Oregon Offshore site. Credit: UW/NSF-OOI/WHOI, J2-1698, V25.

A swarm of krill engulfs the Oregon Offshore Shallow Profiler mooring as the ROV Jason conducts a survey after replacing the profiler pod. Credit: NSF-OOI/UW/WHOI; Dive J2-1698; V25

The OOI-RCA Shallow Profiler mooring platforms sit at 200 meters depth, over time becoming midwater islands of biodiversity as organisms like feather stars and nudibranchs settle on the hard surfaces of the flotation and instrument housings. 🌊🚢🧪

Breaching Humpback whale off the coast of Newport, OR. Credit: J. Tilley, UW-APL, V25

Leg 1 VISIONS'25 students on the bow of the R/V Atlantis as the ship departs Newport. Credit: M. Elend, University of Washington, V25

The 11th O&M Expedition for the cabled component of the NSF-OOI has begun, 7/31 - 8/31/2025! Live video from the R/V Atlantis & Jason ROV can be seen here: interactiveoceans.washington.edu/visions25-li...
🌊🧪🚢

PC 1: J. Tilley, UW-APL, V25.
PC 2: M. Elend, University of Washington, V25

YouTube video by Scientific American Nodules: Deep-Sea Life Giver or Key to Our Energy Future?

It's finally out! 18 months in the making, @fieseler.bsky.social's outstanding documentary on deep-sea mining and an exploration of why some stories capture the public imagination while others don't.

Nodules: Deep-Sea Life Giver or Key to Our Energy Future?

www.youtube.com/watch?v=1jcm...

The eel facts advent calendar has 5 species of eel on it, ribbon eels which are royal blue and bright yellow, american and european eels hanging out in some eelgrass, a yellow moray, and 2 splendid garden eels which are orange and yellow. The boxes are all numbered in fun boxes with orange and light organ zigzags and a yellow oval in each with the number of the day

Drumroll please…

This year’s advent calendars…

Designed by @ehrenenglish.bsky.social…

Will be…

EEL FACTS!!!!

Get one at squidfacts.bigcartel.com

Advent calendars keep Skype a scientist running (weird funding strategy, but hey! It works!), so share these far and wide ❤️

A large group of protesters marching beneath a huge mural of a Black girl called “No Hunger” in Oakland, CA

No Kings (Oakland, CA)

Volcanic Eruption in Deep Ocean Ridge Is Witnessed by Scientists for First Time Researchers diving in a submersible in the eastern Pacific realized that the landscape they had studied the day before had been glassed over by fresh lava.

The EPR is erupting! www.nytimes.com/2025/05/02/s...

I don't know who needs to hear this, but:

1) Megalodon was real, but is definitely super-duper extinct now. (If it wasn't, there'd be evidence, and there isn't any).

2) Mermaids were never real.

3) Narwhal and giant squid are real and you get to live on Earth at the same time as them!

I’m anti death penalty, but I just learned about a person who RIPS OUT THE PAGES OF BOOKS AS HE READS THEM, leaving an empty shell when he’s done. So I’m revising my position.

Hope he heals quickly and that he enjoys his new bionic leg. You went for the full cyborg replacement option, right?

No touchy

Butt Inclusive here. Urchins are not butts. They are also gonads. And riddled with parasites.

This New Video Game Is Actually 50 New Video Games UFO 50 might make you nostalgic for games that never actually existed

UFO 50 is an astonishing accomplishment — a pack of fifty full-fledged games that may make you nostalgic for a 1980s video game console that never actually existed. This week's column: www.bloomberg.com/news/newslet...

Bluesky now has over 10 million users, and I was #362,935! Apparently. I should maybe check in more…

Design counts! Yours are top tier.

8 shrunken styrofoam cups with various designs including a purple octopus, a red squid, and a pika

We’re posting tiny cups?! Here are the recent ones my spouse @echinocrepis.bsky.social made. The rest are in a box somewhere. I love them

Someone said it was post videos of your pets day?

Here is Zuko cocking his head every time I say “walk”

Zuko refuses to ride in the buggy unless the top is down.

Anonymized skeet: This is the key problem, people frame this argument as though incremental improvements are a thing that are already happening rather than our country being on its fourth decade of the exact opposite of incremental improvement.

10 years ago, gay Americans could not get married and have it count in all 50 states
20 years ago, you could be made uninsurable because you got sick once
30 years ago, HIV was a death sentence
40 years ago, acid rain was still a problem

Dedicated public servants keep pushing good things forward

The Federal Trade Commission, of all entities, is out here writing absolute bangers about AI snake oil. www.ftc.gov/business-gui...

They should have just called it “Fin”

Convicted felon Donald Trump pronounced guilty on all 34 counts in historic NYT headline

An historic day. Vastly improved my mood!

Zuko pup, a small black dog, looking out the back door as rain is pouring down

Zuko pup staring at the camera pleadingly, his adorable tan eyebrows and snoot adding to his expression

Zuko pup thinks that we control the rain. He hates it so much and doesn’t understand why we don’t just make it stop. It hurts my heart

Blue Eyed Samurai on Netflix was really amazing: beautiful animation, great writing, cool action. Wasn’t super expecting all the sex and gore, but if you’re okay with mature subject matter it’s a great show.

I was the entertainment at a 5th birthday party: A new favorite science communication gig I recently got an incredible opportunity to do some public science engagement. My friends’ daughter, who absolutely loves sharks, was turning 5 and having friends over for a shark (and pirate…

I wrote about being the entertainment at a birthday party where 5 year olds asked me questions about sharks.
🧪🦑🌎🦈

New YorkTimes screenshot Headline: Science Teacher Finds Missing Piece of Boeing Jet’s Fuselage in His Yard Subhed: Bob Sauer said that his 50-foot cedar trees had acted on the same scientific principle as an airbag, disrupting the door plug’s fall in an act known in physics as impulse.

immense respect to this science teacher for seeing his opportunity and grabbing onto it with both hands