Transfers, hellos and goodbyes

Rob White reports

Today we said goodbye (for a time) to our director Gary Johnstone. An SAR (Search and Rescue) boat came out from Iceland to pick him up - so that he can get on a plane to London to carry on working on other parts of the production.

Ship to ship transfer

It was our first rendezvous at sea - fortunately weather conditions were ideal. This is the boat in which Ted Briggs will come out to join us, with Gary, once we've found the wreck of HMS 'Hood'.

Despite those conditions, like most transfers at sea it had its moments. Gary's athleticism was put to the test as the 'Hannes P. Hafstein' rose and fell with the gentle swell.

We also had some new arrivals - Lindsay Taylor of 'Channel 4 News', and Rob Gould from ITN Factual.

Lindsay made it on board OK despite a sprained ankle, the result of an accident at the weekend. It would have taken a good deal more than that to stop him!

Now the search goes on, with David Mearns and Jim Mercer back on station at the sidescan sonar. By midnight we'd completed our first line, with no outstanding target found but some possibilities.

And we can certainly tell we're in northern latitudes - this picture was taken at ten minutes to midnight.