Submarine ride and secret underwater cave at NOAA

NOAA (National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration) was one of the first sims I visited. Now I can’t remember how I found out about it, but maybe there was a landmark to it in a Notecard I got at the Help Island. The first places I wanted to visit were places with culture and science, and NOAA seemed interesting. I wanted to see the tsunami and glaciers.

I made several trips to NOAA, because I wanted to take my time to see and explore everything they had to show there. And it took me some time to find out how some things worked. The Earth on a Sphere pavilion was a sphere in the middle, representing Earth. Close to the door there is a display from which you can choose what you want to see, and it will appear on the sphere, but you will only see that if you enable the video option first (at the bottom of your screen, in the middle). The first time I was there I didn’t get that (I was too new to SL).

At the beach close by, there are two summer chairs. You can calmly sit on a chair, as if as it’s a quiet afternoon and nothing extraordinary is going to happen anyway... And then you click on the display nearby and a tsunami rises and floods the beach and the building nearby, living your poor avatar underwater. Help! Not even close to the real thing, but as close as it can be in SL, so you have to admire it. But hey, this is not all that there is to it. You must walk underwater to the sea, so just go ahead and walk straight ahead and away from the beach, until you see another display. When you click on it, you will see a simulation of how the movement of tectonic plates will move the sea floor up, causing the water to rise, which in turn will cause a wave that will speed towards the land as a tsunami. SL can’t show exactly how that is, so if you are interested in tsunamis you should click the links and check the websites.

All around NOAA you will find links to interesting websites with information on climate, geology, and even underwater creatures. It’s worth giving them a try.

You can also take a ride on an airplane to see a hurricane from above. I have often seen people trying to make the airplane take off but failing to do so. So I thought I would explain how it works: right click on the airplane and choose Sit. You will be sitting inside the airplane next. If you are using mouselook, press M to get out of mouselook, and use your camera controls to be able to see the airplane from a little distance, just so that the black display is visible in the screen. Then click on the display and that will activate the airplane and it will take off. It will take you for a ride and back to the same place.

After that, try taking a ride on an atmospheric balloon. Just grab on it and click the display, and you will be taken high up in the skies, above the clouds. At some point, the balloon will explode and you will be on a free fall to the ground. Oh, of course, before trying this balloon thing, if you are a girl wearing a skirt or a Scottish guy with a kilt, just be sure to put some underwear on beforehand, in case there’s people around. I had a skirt but happily I had something underneath it, LOL!

In the picture below I'm falling after the balloon exploded. On the ground you can see the airplane I mentioned above.

The first time I visited the glacier I looked at it from the wrong spot. Only after I read at Natalia’s blog her description of her visit to NOAA that I got to know you can see the glacier melting, so I had to go back there to see it. You have to stand on the beach in front of the glacier and click the black display, and it will melt.

Then, there is the submarine ride! The submarine works the same way as the airplane: first sit inside it, then click the black display and it will start. It will take you underwater and make some few short stops. Don’t just sit inside the submarine, or if you do that, take another ride and then choose Stand up to leave the submarine. After that, walk underwater. You will find a secret underwater cave:

The cave is small, but when you are leaving it through the other side, you will see creel, plants, and if you keep walking and exploring you will see schools of fish, jellyfish, crabs, polyps, sponges, and all sorts of things.

I was lucky the jellyfish don’t sting in SL! ;-)

When you click them, you will be given a link to a webpage with information on the animal or plant. There’s a lot to see and lots of information.

There was a cute crab moving around my feet when I walked below the jellyfishes.

And there are dolphins and killer whales (what not many people know is that the killer whale is not a whale, but the biggest kind of dolphin).

You might also try to do like I did and right-click on a killer whale and choose Sit, and have a free ride on its back. But then it might happen what happened to me: the whale went through under the bridge and I got stuck in it and had to teleport.

Wilhelmina swimming with the fishes.

Right at the center of this image you can see kelps (large seaweeds), and like with the other plants and creatures in this sim, if you click on it you will get info on it.

An underwater volcano, or hot spring, and the kind of life that can grow at such hot temperatures (don’t look at me, I prefer the cold!).

So many legs and this little fellow didn’t try to grab me, what a sweety!

Sponges, polyps and other sea creatures.

The SLURL for NOAA is Meteora (177,161,27).

Have fun!