Last day on the ice - April 14

There are still more pictures, journal entries, and Q and A by Robert on the web. On a future date, the archived version of the webinar will be made available. Already posted is a movie about and from the ice camp (or here, "APLIS ice camp", if there are problems with the previous link).

This is the last day on the ice, with the majority of the people returning to terra firma (Prudhoe/Fairbanks).


copyright Los Angeles Times article

Updates out of Arctic

There are lots of new pictures now from the ice camp and the science around it, www.polartrec.com/gallery/sedna-ice-camp. Below are some samples. Robert posted some comments on life at the camp, and a webinar from the ice by him on Thursday is planned.


The flags set up to monitor the lead on line 3 have moved apart 2-3 meters as the lead has opened. They are also offset by 1 meter.

Deploying buoys.
Casting a transect line.

Science ramp up

In the first few days, everybody at the camp (and also those people supporting them elsewhere) has been very busy. 6 more local GPS buoys were deployed (with the help of a helicopter) across an active boundary, to give some small-scale ground truth to compare to SAR satellite imagery (synthetic aperture radar). Stress buoys were deployed. Snow measurements were initiated (six 1 km transects). The picture above is a summary of the ideal measurement configuration; the two pictures below are week-old satellite image analyses of the ice camp environments regarding leads (open cracks in the sea ice) and other similar features and dimensions. Keep in mind that two degrees of latitude corresponds to 220 km (140 mi), and two degrees of longitude are ... well, that depends on the latitude you are looking at. I would say 65 km (40 mi) at 73 degrees North.




It is curious that generally speaking, the air temperatures observed at the camp are quite balmy, more corresponding to a good old cold snap in Vermont. As the heaters inside the huts are designed for much colder temps, apparently drastic measures like vents in the roof were necessary. All right, as long as all that doesn't mean accelerated melting underneath them this Spring ...

Phase 2: Leaving Terra Firma

Today (Saturday) is the final transfer for Cathy and Robert, to Deadhorse AK on the Northern coast of Alaska, from where they are taken to the ice camp by airplane. Colleagues of theirs had already made the trek to the camp and found out that some equipment had not yet been delivered, but that problem was apparently solved.

The attraction of Deadhorse is its airport. The village is next to the commercial Prudhoe bay oil extraction facility (which in turn is the starting point of the trans-Alaskan oil pipeline). See google maps for an overview. Note the blurring of the image at the coastline (...).

Cathy and Robert had an event-filled week. The outing to Fort Yukon, AK, was a success and an educating experience for all (see many details in Robert's journal, and through Cathy's e-mail at a second blog). While Fort Yukon has great telecommunication connection to the rest of the US, Cathy tried the satellite phone nevertheless. It is from the Iridium satellite network. It is an experience (just as described in the link), because conversations are more than 1 second latent (puts a serious damper onto spontaneity), and the voice spectrum is pretty mangled that the listener assumes a serious case of laryngitis - which was not the case, by the way. But it is better than nothing, and this will be the type of device with which the researchers at the ice camp can keep in touch with the homebases. Since Cathy is involved in remote sensing (satellite imagery), it is planned to physically carve a daily data DVD and shuttle it (helicopter/airplane) to and from the ice camp to Deadhorse and Fairbanks. One aspect of the experiment is to make use of the near real-time satellite ice field assessment to plan, alter, and execute the ground measurements.

Note added a few hours after the original post: I was the lucky recipient of the first Iridium call from the ice camp. Cathy and Robert made it right up, with almost no layover in Deadhorse. They are well, and excited, and things at the camp are going well. They are basically unpacking and setting themselves up. With such a wonderful instant feedback from the polar cap, I vow to not speak negatively again of the Iridium system ... !

The caller ID stated "out of area."

The weather is nice, some wind, and -20F; the Sun is low in the sky. The flight was interesting, and so was apparently the landing. But details of that will have to wait to when a DVD or CD makes it out of the camp, and the info to me.

Almost a week ago an array of GPS buoys was deployed and anchored to the drifting ice. The deployment occurred in a strategic pattern that will allow to assess the fundamentals of sea ice motion; see the track picture below and the location overview at this link. When the science portion of the ice camp gets under way, another set of stress/strain measuring devices is going to be deployed.
Caption for figure above: Location tracks of the moored ice buoys. The diameter of the outer formation is roughly 200 km. The formation participates in common drift, but also in subtle changes in relation to each other (stress/strain/divergence).

Fort Yukon, AK

Today, Cathy and Robert are flying into Fort Yukon, AK. This is such a remote village that no roads to it exist. The village is located at a bend in the Yukon River, and in fact the scenery from a satellite is so beautiful with the meandering rivers - look for yourself.


The green arrow points to the village. The image comes from maps.google.com and is subjected to the copyright stated there. Get a high-resolution picture here, but only if you have broadband. It is 3Mbytes.

Our friend Brenda is a teacher there, and her classroom will get a visit by the two Sedna members for a special session. It will also get connected to Robert's classroom in Vermont.

Stargate - Continuum

No headline-grabbing news from the ice camp in the Beaufort sea. Which is a good thing. If all goes according to plan, a film crew (MGM) is shooting footage for the Sci-Fi series Stargate (see link). Hey, the marriage of Arctic sea ice with space physics, where have I seen that before?

Meanwhile, the researcher team is slated to do training on polar bears. No, not how to feed or groom them. They are still in Fairbanks for this training and for final preparations toward the end of this week. For mid-week, an excursion (outreach) to Fort Yukon is planned.

Cold enough for ice sculptures

Today was the "learn to return" training where they had a full day of medical rescue training, how to dress, eat, and take care of themselves in the Arctic and Antarctic. Cathy writes:

"There was a particularly long and detailed section on frostbite and hypothermia which left in all of us the harsh details of what happens if you freeze then thaw (swollen digits) or refreeze your digits (black and you lose them). The training was sufficient to teach us all to really watch our fingers and toes to make sure that we really take special care of them. Nothing like seeing big screen photos of what happens when you don't monitor the health of your fingers and toes. It really snaps you into shape about taking care of yourself."

"After a big banquet at a very nice local restaurant, we all got in the van and went to the annual ice sculpture competition which is an international event hosted in Fairbanks. The imagery was spectacular. The weather is actually quite nice here. It was near 20F during the day and only got down to about 5F while at the Ice Park."

Phase 1: Fairbanks

After a day of travel, everyone got to Fairbanks all right.

The current coordinates are now:
Latitude = 64 degrees, 50 minutes North

Longitude = 147 degrees, 40 minutes West
The camp is basically due North, about another 7 degrees (800km, 500 miles). Meanwhile, at the ice camp, already bustling with activity (sans WomenOnIce), some international excitement ensued, unfortunately not of the good kind. But also not related to the Arctic or the cold weather, either. It did create some public video footage of how it looks in the region; the footage is from about 3 km away from the camp (watch video).

Happy Birthday

Today is the birthday of Johann Sebastian Bach. 322 years ago.

This sure is a pretty random fact, and has about zero connection to the Arctic sea ice. The two team members that are connected to the Arctic sea ice are in transit to Fairbanks today.

Equinox

Today (21 March shortly after midnight in Greenwich Time) is the Spring equinox, when the Sun rises for observers at the North pole and stays up for slightly more than half a year. For all lower latitudes away from the region surrounding the pole, there will be 12 hours of daylight and 12 hours of nighttime. After today, this uniformity will break up rapidly: April 1, there will already be 14 hours of daylight at Sedna ice camp, and by April 14, this increases to 16.5 hours. Compare that to Boston with 12.5 and 13.5 hours, respectively.

What does this mean for Sedna? Sunrise at 6:40, sliding back to 5:20, and sunset at 9, sliding back to 10. Not much opportunity, really, to see the aurora AND get some sleep ...