May 14, the Healy headed out to sea! It had to be pulled from the dock and pointed in the right direction by two tugboats. The tugboats have to be very powerful to pull a ship that is over 420 feet long! Everyone was on the deck watching during this exciting moment. It was farewell to land for the next six weeks. The ship began plowing through the water at a speedy 17 knots, that’s about 22 miles per hour, which may sound slow for a car but for such a large ship it is fast. After motoring through the night, the ship arrived at its first stop by 12:00 P.M. the next day. The scientists used this first stop for their “shakedown”. A shakedown is a practice station in which they can try out equipment and procedures. In this way, they can fix anything that is not working correctly before they begin collecting actual samples.