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Bob “Yogi” Elder (left) and Rob Palomares install the 12 kiloHertz pinger (the silver cylinder) on the DSL-120 clump weight. The clump weight is placed above the DSL-120 so that it absorbs most of the movement of the ship. This allows the sonar fish to “fly” in a straight line rather than going up and down with the ship. The clump weight is about 30 meters in front of the sonar fish. The pinger tells how far above the seafloor the clump weight is. If the distance between the seafloor and the clump weight decreases, then we know that the seafloor is getting shallower and we have to pull the sonar fish up. It the distance between the seafloor and the clump weight increases, then the seafloor is getting deeper and we can lower the sonar fish.

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