A YEAR ON THE ICE: SHEBA LOG
Sunday
September 29
At 8:00 AM the ships began moving northward
again towards the defined location
for IOEB-2. Progress is excellent, with speeds as high as 9 knots. On the down
side this excellent progress is due to the ice being quite thin which could be
an implemement for finding a floe for SHEBA. Late in the morning the weather
began to clear somewhat and a helo flight with Jacques the ice observer was
scheduled for after lunch. I got a message from Jackie outlining the positions
of the SHEBA buoy array, which has now grown to 13 elements. Trying to draw it
is as confusing as putting toys together on Christmas morning. In the midst of
this exercise the ice observer, Jacques, returned from an extensive survey
flight in search of a big floe for SHEBA. After considerable looking he was
able to find one candidate, so Jumper and I went to look at it. For the details
see the floe search summary. In short, it wasn’t bad, 10 cm of snow, there was
a nice 30 cm frozen lead, and the surface in much better shape that the floes
we have looking at on the way up. Unfortunately it wasn’t good either. It was
too thin with average thickness of only 130 cm and from the small-scale surface
topography had undergone considerable melting. We encountered a few bottomless
melt ponds. Still it is somewhat
encouraging even though the search must continue.
When we returned to the ship I started to fill
Andy in, when he said there is a little problem and you are wanted on the
bridge. Apparently there was a rumor on the Louis that we had found the SHEBA
floe and Jackie looked at a map and realized that the ships were in a good
place to deploy the WHOI Buoy so we called Dick. I don’t know exactly what
transpired, but the gist was that Jackie said the ships should stop until I got
back. If any event I dropped in the middle of this, and by some stroke of
fortune came up with a good answer. I talked to Kyoshi and asked if he wanted a
different postion for Jamstec. He talked to Kogi and they said no, please put
in the agreed place. Which was exactly the answer I wanted. I then called
Jackie and explained the situation and said it was OK for the ships to move.
There were two contributing factors to the mixup. One its difficult having the
party split on two different ships. I’m doing a reasonable job of communicating
with the SHEBA crew on the Des Groseilleirs, but not with the people on the
Louis. It turns out that not even the faxes I’ve been sending have not been getting
there. So I need to work harder on that. Second, the buoy group is getting a
bit too focused on an artistic vision of the where the WHOI buoy should be. It
just may not be possible. I guess its my job to provide balance.
Talked about the floe at the evening meeting and
had a nice discussion. Afterwards Andy and I started talking contingencies if
we can’t find anything thicker. With all of our cargo we could have a major
problem. Called Jackie back on the Louis to fill her in on the floe, ask her to
balance the ocean part of the array, and suggest a course of action on the two
helo problem. Part 1 went well, but not 2 and 3. Jamie was there so I couldn’t
discuss balancing the ocean and when I outlined Captain Langis suggested course
of action for the helo, but got the distinct impression that Jackie didn’t
think it would work. Talking on the radio, with the world listening, definitely
complicates resolving issues. Andy and I have been working on the problem from
this end to hopely it will be resolved. Jamie did have a suggestion as where
the SHEBA floe could be located to make the ocean remote sites balanced...
Monday
September 29
The J-Team, Jacques and Jumper went flying this
morning in search of the perfect floe. First they went looking for Jumper’s
heart shaped floe. They found something, but aren’t sure if it was the same floe. In any event
it was too thin. They stopped at 2 more floes, the last of which was the best.
Jumper and I went to check it out. Its big, Jumper’s estimate is 4x8 miles. We
landed in a couple of spots and measured some thicknesses. There was a frozen
lead that was 44 cm thick. Pretty healthly growth for this early in the season.
We tried to play fair and drill only in places that appeared “normal”. Jumper’s
notes have the measurements. Basically the “standard” ice ranged from 1.7 to
2.0 m. In general, it was the most solid of the floes in terms of hard drilling
and the hole being dry. The chips were dry to about a depth of 90 cm. The snow
cover was 5-10 cm on the level, 20-30 in the ponds. The results from a snow
survey sampled every meter are: 4,6,6,6,6,5,5,8,10,10,8,9,10,6,7,10,6,4,6, 18,
6,5,7,6,7,7,8,6,9,6,9,6, 6,5,9,5,18, 6,6,7,5,4,4,6,5,10,5. Ponds had frozen
over about 40 cm. Every imaginable ice type was present on this floe, ponds,
hummocks, ridges, lead, etc. Its a little too thin and a bit too wide, but
right now its the best bet for the SHEBA home floe.
At the evening meeting we talked about the days
surveys and, in particular, about the choice #1. I outlined the features and
drawbacks of the floe in a neutral manner, trying to hit potential problems as
well as strengths. There wasn’t much in the way of comments from the general
audience. After the meeting Andy and I got together to discuss strategy for
tomorrow. Then Andy, Alain, Jumper, Miles and I got together to deal with the
nitty-gritty issues of the floe. Right now it appears to be our best choice.
Tomorrow we’ll try to fly the captain out to the floe for his opinion and also
see if we can find a natural harbor.
Talked to Jackie about all this and asked her to
fill in the SHEBA-Louis crowd. Sounds likes the potential dual helicopter woes
have been sucessfully resolved. Right now life is good, its time to go to bed.
Tuesday 30
September
Woke up early and checked e-mail. There was a
message! Unfortunately, it was an internal message rather than one from home.
Just as an aside life on the ship is pretty good. Food is excellent and there
are always sandwich fixings and leftovers available. In the Canadian tradition
there are lots of cookies available.
Talked to Jim Swift this morning to
ask a) if could do a ctd cast for the JAMSTEC folks, b) any word from the
Laurier, c) any word about doing the NWR mooring from the Louis on the way out.
They answers were yes, no, and no. During the morning work began on the
installation of IOEB-2. After some difficulty with the hole melter the work
went exceptionally well. Everything was installed and up and running by 1600
hours local time. At the same time SHEBA remote site 5 was installed. RS5 is
pretty simple Stein’s acoustic instrument plus a stress sensor. The stress
sensor took about 10 minutes and the acoustic sensor about 3 hours. Hopefully
their times will improve. I did have a chance to talk with Jackie and Bruce. It
was nice to be able to talk to Jackie face to face and not have to guess things
over the radio. There were a few minor problems regarding the dual helo
operations, that were cleared up (see above), but the real major problem has
been with Jamie. Apparently he has been a total pain about the buoy
arrangement. His approach is “Forget SHEBA, do all the buoys the way I want.”
This has gone beyond the typical scientific arguments to just plain being
abusive. Jackie is surprised that all this abuse is coming from someone she
thought was a friend. I’m not, since the same thing happened to me when I
became SHEBA chair. So I gave her a pep talk and said I’ll back up any
decisions she makes. She also said Jamie was being seditous and telling
everyone in earshot how messed up SHEBA was. Andy and I talked about this and
decided we didn’t need one of the experienced leader types bringing morale
down. If we see that happening we may ask Jumper to give him an IQ test.
After the meeting we sailed in the
direction of the SHEBA primary floe until around 10PM. Other events of the day
included lifting of the smoking ban and moving the science meetings to the
cafeteria. The evening meeting was full of good news regarding the day’s
activities.
Wednesday 1
October
Beautiful sunrise this morning. Looks
like good flying weather. The Captain and Jumper took off right after breakfast
to check out the primary floe. They returned about 5 minutes later because of
bad visibility. Andy, Dick, Jumper and I talked strategy for a while regarding
the deployment phase. We waited for weather the rest of the morning. Finally at
around 1500 the weather clear, but in the meanwhile the helos rotors had rimed
up, so it had to be heated. Jumper and the Captain lifted off again in search
of the lost floe. More precisely, in search of the lost garbage bag that marked
the floe. They found it, got their orientation and flew back towards the lead
on the eastern boundary and found the Louis sitting there. They found a nice
entry point. Tonight we sail to and into the floe and finish the parking job
tomorrow.
Thursday
October 2
The weather looks crummy this morning
with low clouds and light snow. We could use just an hour of flying weather to
help find the right path for the ship to enter the floe. Jumper may just set a
path by skidoo. At 900 AM the weather lifts enough for a helo recon with Jumper
and the Captain. They find the ultimate destination of the ship and return. At
around 1000 AM we begin moving towards home. The weather continued to improve
and I got a call from Jackie that they were going to fly. I was hoping for Site
3 or 4 (25km mass balance), but the pilots were leery about the weather.
Instead we did 9 and 10 of the 15 km array. We had time for 11, but Sigrid
wasn’t sure if her instrument was working. Could be a missed opportunity. Here
is some data from the trip
RS9 : Hi=1.16, Fb=0.90. Snow
survey results from approximately every meter 8 18 16 10 11 12 15 18 16 18 9 17
14 1/ 8 8 9 15 22 24 22 11 14 12 11 11 12 13 13 13 13 16 18 22 26 7 9 35.
RS 10: Hi=1.62, Fb=1.37.
Snow survey results from approximately every meter 14 14 20 22 20 14 8 9 8 13
12 9 9 7 7 14 16 15 10 12 9 18 13 9 10 7 8 7.
After dropping Jackie off on
the LSL Daniel and I were flying around the boundary of the floe when word came
that Buster wanted to fly
Friday October
3
Today was unloading cargo, moving fuel
drums and building huts. Unfortunately, our stuff is still buried deep in the
hold so mainly I acted as a tour guide when the party from the Louis showed up.
Pointing out all the highlights of our splendid floe. While the weather was OK
for working on the ice, it wasn't good for flying, so we couldn't deploy any
remote sites. Hopefully we'll get to some of our stuff tomorrow. Todays bad
news was that IOEB-2 isn’t speaking to the world so Rick Krishfield requested a
rescue mission.
I was talking to Jackie when the Louis
group was over today and she had a good story. As I said yesterday Andy, Dick
and I were over on the Louis last night for a SHEBA meeting. Well this morning
the Executive Officer called her into his office and chewed her out for failing
to bring the visiting dignitary (i.e. me) to visit the Captain. I believe the
statement was "The Captain should be introduced to visitors of this
stature." Finally some respect.
Saturday
October 4
Yet another gray overcast day, and a
windy one at that. Jackie, Bruce and Bill came over on the morning shuttle.
Bruce started moving fuel drums, while the rest of us and we got to work
building a platform for our hut. The
weather began to improve at 1030 so I was called to the bridge to authorize the
hunt for IOEB-2. Also the Scientific Solutions stuff isn’t working so one of
their guys is going along too.
During our lunch break Jackie was
paged to the bridge. It was the Louis saying that flying weather is improving.
We decided to go for site 4. After a taxi ride to the Louis and a long climb up
the gangway and a packing flail, we took off at 1415. I was back home at 1730.
For all the running around we did a good job. There were a few snafus. First
the ice had moved alot so we almost went too far. Luckily I was bored and
reading the GPS display. Second of all the thermistor strings stink. They used
black cable of all things and had the cable come out the front side of the
string. For $1000 a string you expect more. Otherwise things went well. Photos
are on roll 4. Here are the stats:
RS4: Thermistor string, ice thickness is
1.90 cm; freeboard is 1.62. String design was 4 connected together with the
fifth one doubled up right between strings 1 and 2. The probe was installed so
that the break between 1 and 2 was at the surface with 5 extending upward and
downward equally. Gauge 97: ice thickness of 1.85; surface was 13 cm below the
end of the tape, gauge was at a height of 1.05 m up the tape. Gauge 98: Thickness was 1.85, freeboard
was 1.64, surface was 12 cm below the end of the tape and the initial gauge
height was 0.84 m. Gauge 96: Ice thickness was 1.82 m; freeboard was 1.53 m,
surface was 11 cm below tape and gauge height was 108 cm. During installation
the snow was cleared away, bu the wind was blowing so it should drift back in.
Sunday October
5
The day started auspiciously
Monday October
6
Weather looks great (for here) this
morning. Its cold, but not foggy with a clear horizon. So hopefully we’ll be
off to Site 1 or 2. Not so fast. Robert the helo pilot on the Louis is sick. So
we only have one chopper. We decide to do site 3. The weather is good enough
that we think we can leave people. Bruce, the bear guard and I went on the
first chopper load, then Jackie, Sigrid and Armand came on the second. Pickings
for a floe were rather slim. We’ve been trying to find kilometer diameter
floes, this one was more like a few hundred meters. The installation went super
well. It took a little under 3 hours using both helos. We then sent Sigrid and
Bruce off to do site 6. This went so well that they also had time to do site
12. Great day of flying for Daniel. In the midst of switching from site 3 to 6
Jamie wanted to have a meeting about what to do next. I decided to get 6
started first then worry about philosophical issues. It was a very upbeat
meeting tonight; science cargo was unloaded today and people are psyched. Bill
told me that I should take Jackie to dinner in the officers mess as a reward
for acting as SHEBA Louis Liason. So with the Captains permission I did. Also
it seemed like the thing to do since Andy and I were sending her on another
difficult mission: talking to the Captain of the Louis about doing a site on
the way out. Here are the stats for Site 3.
Site 3: Storage module is
SM3484.
Thermistor hole: Hi=1.65,
Fb=1.35 m. Thermistor string was configured same as site 4, four in a row with
the fifth one doubled up between 1 and 2 and the string installed so that the bottom
of 1 is at the surface.
Stake 93: Hi=1.71, Fb=1.48.
Initial readings of thickness gauge is 1.015 on stake and the end of the tape
is 22 cm above the surface.
Stake 94: Hi=1.71, Fb=1.48.
Initial readings of thickness gauge is 1.015 on stake and the end of the tape
is 29 cm above the surface.
Stake 95: Hi=1.73, Fb=1.48.
Initial readings of thickness gauge is 1.26 on stake and the end of the tape is
25 cm above the surface.
Tuesday 7
October
Good news from Jackie regarding the
Louis. As a contingency they will put in the southwest supersite if we can’t
get it done by helo. Flying weather was good again, but Robert is still sick so
we only have one helo. In spite of that we decide to do a supersite in serial,
rather than parallel mode. The CRREL team left first to install our mass
balance stuff and drill holes for everyone. We flew out 50 km picked a floe and
landed. Unfortunately it was a crummy floe, too much rubble. So we lifted off
moved around a km and tried again with better success. We installed our mass
balance equipment in good form, but had trouble with the underwater pinger. Its
not clear if its working properly. Drilling holes was tough. Lots of 10 inch
holes with one through a 3 m ridge for Jamie. The thickest ice of the
experiment and we have to put a 10 inch hole through it. In lieu of an evening
meeting we watched a video of this summers cruise of the Des Groseilliers
ending with the installation of SHEBA. Jackie has all the information about the
site in her notebook.
Wednesday 8
October
Beautiful weather this morning, though
its a bit breezier. For helo ops the plan is to finish site 1, then try to do
the JIC buoys. If there is any time left, do some surveying of the SHEBA floe.
After breakfast Bill and I went over the Louis to help Jackie pack things up
for shipment to the Des Groseilliers, Bruce was off flying with Sigrid. To keep
Jackie out of trouble I went up to meet Captain Gomes and had a very nice chat.
Then it was off to the hut that Bill built for box unpacking and organizing. We
have most of our stuff except for the thickness gauge stuff; wire, cross pieces
and chain. The weather gradually deteriorated throughout the day, with winds
increasing and visibility decreasing. By supper it was an all-out blow, 30-40
winds and snow. Super site 1 was completed, but Bruce and Sigrid were turned
back by weather before the JIC buoys could be deployed. Meanwhile out on the
ice black plumes of smoke for the Louis’ stack descended onto the “clean zone.”
Off for my second trip of the day to the bridge of the Louis. The scene was
somewhat surreal. I politely pointed out to the Captain that a black cloud was
descending onto our floe, at which point he looked out the window and said “Wow
this looks bad! Whats going on here?” Apparently the incinerator was
malfunctioning. Meanwhile Jim Swift was on the bridge having a discussion
regarding the Northwind Ridge Mooring and setting records for the most “sirs”
in a sentence. The two captains, George Legge and me got faxes from the
Japanese thanking us for our efforts and extolling us to put in the NWR
mooring. This evening, for the first time this experiment, the CRREL ice team
was all together for a meeting.
Made the evening radio call to Jackie
on the Louis thinking it would be perfunctory, but she had lots of news all of
it bad. Jim Purdy told her, with obvious relish, that there was no way that the
Louis was taking all ten SHEBA people and that the Louis was leaving Friday. It
was clear that Jackie was upset by the news. She suggested that we do something
about it, and we will.
Thursday 9
October
Flying weather is bad, no contrast.
Talked to the Captain this morning regarding Jackies’ news and it shouldn’t be
a problem. I suspect that the Louis will take all the people and won’t leave until
11 October. After a quick meeting with Andy it was off to the ice. Bill found
all of our stuff, so Bill and Bruce made thickness gauges while Jackie and I
scouted sites. The light was somewhat flat and we were having a hard time
finding a decent site near Ed’s tower. We put in a placeholder and gave up.
There were areas of snow that were visibly darker. We then decided that a
change in venue was needed, so we hiked over the local ridge and found that
things were much nicer real estate. We selected not one, not two, but three
sites; a supersite, a melt pond site and a ridge site. After lunch the four of
us went over to install the pond and supersite. Got the pond site totally
completed and the supersite 80% done. We had a small problem with the thickness
kits getting to flights to work together. All the setup notes are in Jackie’s
book. Curfew for the Louis folks was extended to 1930 tonight. They must be
behaving well.
Friday 10
October
Flying weather looks very promising.
Came up with a plan last night to use one chopper to install the remaining 2
JIC sites and the other to do local floe stuff like mapping, site selection and
aerial photography. Jackie, Ed and I took off in 366 (Des Groseilliers) chopper
to fly the perimeter and look for potential PAM sites. We found candidates for
young ice, rough ice and smooth ice. The young ice is also a potential backup
runway. We’re going to put out a mass balance site at the young ice location,
which will also serve as the anchor for a chain of 1 km spaced stress sites
that Jackie will install. In the middle of this exercise we got a call from the
Louis saying how about supersite 2. We decided to stick with the original plan
and worry about 2 on the way out. It took a bit of discussion to stay with our
original plan, but we did. Our perservence received a tip of the cap from
Daniel and the Captain. Jackie did a great job handling the radio discussions.
Sticking with the plan we then did an aerial photography flight. Afterwards
Bruce, Jackie and I loaded up two stress sensors sites into the chopper and
started deploying her “chain” of sites. We got the first one deployed quickly
(35 minutes) and went off to the second when the weather almost instantly
closed in. So it was straight back to the ship. I’m glad we weren’t at site 2.
Returning to the ship at 1645 the Louis announced that the crew transfer would
be at 1800. So it was a mad flail for everyone to get ready. We had to transfer
the remaining CRREL equipment as well as get Jackie and Bruce moved. After all
of this the Louis decided that it wasn’t going anywhere for the evening. The
CRREL ice team is now all aboard the Des Groseilliers.
Saturday 11
October
This morning Bruce and Bill went out
to find a road to “Baltimore”, the young ice site. Jackie and I finished
installing site 202-the local supersite. In the afternoon Bill and Bruce worked
on the road some more while Jackie and I installed a 500 m line extending over
the ridge through Site “Quebec” and out. Then we did a 500 m snow survey (every
5 m) and a 100 m albedo transect. Light was fading during the albedo
measurements and the incidents were pretty low. Sky conditions were complete
overcast some brightening to the south. Took a site photo looking down along
the transect.
Sunday 12
October
Another nice day with light winds and
morning temperatures around -18C. Its SHEBA Indian Summer. After all the fuss
Friday evening the Louis has made all of 500 m progress moving away from the
SHEBA home floe. Apparently they’re having some sort of engine problem. With
this good weather maybe they can fly and install Site 2. We’re off for an
ambitious day of site installation. Our first goal is the stress sites 1 and 2
km counterclockwise from Baltimore. We had problems with the 2 km site (Odessa)
since it was hard to determine where the edge of the main floe was. After
considerable wandering around we picked a site. Summary is in Jackies notes.
Then it was off to the 1 km site (Wilmington) which was much smoother. Took
some site photos at the end of a roll of film. We got back to the ship around
1400 had a quick snack and went back to Baltimore with a mass balance site and
a stress site. We put the mass balance site in the young ice (Hi=38 cm). The
young ice is about 120 m across and 400 m long. Jackie put stress sensors in
the young ice and in the adjacent thicker ice. Did a snow survey with lines
perpendicular and parallel to the young ice. New roll of film with site photos
of Baltimore at the beginning. Returned to camp at 1800 and received a message
to meet the chopper coming in from site 2. They got part of the site deployed
before the visibility deteriorated. At the end it sounded liked last chopper
out of Saigon time. The good news is the radiometers and POP buoy were
deployed. The bad news is that the thermistor string, acoustic sensor and
tiltmeter were not. After deploying the radiometers Armen and Mike spent a
bunch of time messing around with the acoustic sensor. They put it down a melt
pond with a false bottom and got thoroughly stuck. They also abandoned the game
plan which was radiometer, POP buoy, thermistor string, acoustic, tiltmeter.
Its too bad because the thermistor string is trivial to install.
Monday 13
October
This morning Bruce and Bill went out
to blaze the trail to Milford and Dover, two of Jackies stress sensor sites.
Meanwhile Jackie and I worked finding a thermodynamic site near the proposed
location of the 20 m met tower.
After some looking we found a site which we named Pittsburgh. We spent
the rest of the morning installing the thermistor string. We couldn’t do the
thickness gauges since we were missing a wrench needed to change adapters on
the Jiffy. After lunch it was team picture time with the SHEBA scientists and
most of the crew of the Des Groseilliers. We decided that there probably wasn’t
enough time to install Milford and Dover, given the long commute. Instead we
installed Delaware, the central stress site. Delaware is about .75 nm from the
ship situated in the middle of the stress arc. Upon return Bruce and I hooked
up the thermistor strings at Pittsburgh, but they weren’t working. Bruce
swapped the box and everything was fine. We are also having problems with the
pingers. It made be due to the program or to the pingers needing more time to
warm up. There was a brief discussion about boots on the ship, but it was all
resolved amiably. The first rotation is tomorrow and this is the last night for
the SHEBA deployment team, so extra treats are in order.
Tuesday 14
October
Beautiful morning; no fog, light winds
and T=-20. Bill and Bruce took an early run around the runway. Once the sun
comes up (around 0900), we start packing for Milford and Dover. We decided to
take the direct route to Dover rather than following the main road through
Rehobeh. This is a great idea until the fog rolls in. But through effective use
of the GPS and intersecting the Milford-Dover “road” we find Dover with little
difficulty. Installation went like a charm, as we’re really getting this
routine down. Jackie and I did a 2-line, parallel-perpendicular snow survey.
Then it was off to Milford to repeat the routine. The fog has lifted somewhat
and we can see the ship. We can also see the arrival of the Twin Otter. After
Milford it was Rehoboth and another snow survey. We also spent 15 minutes
investigating the local lead. The lead is about 200 m from the stress site and
is 150 m wide with around 5-10 cm of new ice. There were some beautiful frost
flowers on the surface; nice, very large dendrites. Jackie and I also looked at
some more at the melt pond “shefs”. Just like leads only smaller. Stopped at
Atlanta on the way home to get some thicknesses. Just before Atlanta we found a
huge melt pond that has runway potential. Got back to the ship around 1400 and
had a snack. I met Wayt Gibbs and Malcolm Brown from Scientific American and
the NY Times. We got together briefly on the bridge for a discussion with Dick,
the Captain and me. I had to leave to help finish mass balance site Pittsburgh
with Bill, Bruce and Jackie. Afterwards Jackie and I went out to Quebec to
check on things. There were a few science highlights at the evening science
meeting. Jamie’s CTD data shows fresher water (27 vs. 28) with twice as much
heat as AIDJEX, indicating an extensive summer melt. This is consistent with
the ice observations. Also Igor talked about his dive. The bottom had the hard
glazed appearance of melting ice. There was no evidence of new growth.
Wednesday
October 15
We had a beautiful sunrise this
morning, red skies and we actually saw the sun before it disappeared into the
ever present low stratus. Of course the sunrise was at 0930, a reminder that
we’re losing daylight in a hurry. This morning we lead a field trip to
Baltimore consisting of the CRREL Ice Team (Jackie, Bill, Bruce and me), Ed,
John Militizer, Miles and reporters from Scientific American and the NYT.
Jackie and I played tour guide to the reporters, while Bill and Bruce setup a
200 m snow survey line. After the tour the four of us worked on installing 10
thickness gauges on a perpendicular line from the lead edge into the thicker
ice. It proved to be a much harder job than expected. There was deformed ice at
the edge and we were getting thicknesses of 3 m and greater. We can only go to
4 m with the thickness kit, so it was tough. We didn’t get back to the ship
until 1530, so we more or less called it a day. We spent the rest of the
afternoon building thickness gauges and getting things ready to go. 33 gauges
done and 67 to go.
Thursday
October 16
Friday October
17
It looks like GMA is coming on Monday.
They will not be broadcasting live, but will be filming various segments. Dick
has arranged a number of interesting choices for them - the good news is that
the seed of highlighting Jackie has taken root. After breakfast I gave the
Captain and some of the crew an overview of SHEBA and a tour of the village.
Meanwhile Bruce, Bill and Jackie were getting ready to install some ablation
stakes on the main line. We spent the day installing 16 stakes along the line
at spacings of 2.5 and 5 m. At times it was frustrating. Everyone is working
hard and we’re working well as a team, but the equipment is letting us done.
The auger in the thickness kit is worthless. The only way it will cut is if you
lean on it. We tried running with two Jiffys-one with a 1 m section and the
other with a two. In theory it was a great idea, but the one Jiffy didn’t run
and you could swallow one of the bits without cutting yourself. Also 1/3 of the
ablation stakes are too big to fit in the hole, and we’re running out of double
crimps and copper wire. On he bright side everyone is handling the annoyances
well, with laughter rather than anger. But it slows things down and I hate to
see us working harder than we should. Passed out Tootsie roll pops to Bill,
Bruce and Jackie for their heroic efforts.
Saturday
October 18
We decided to drill the ridge today.
It was a beautiful morning with the moon high in the sky. jackie and I took
advantage of the morning light to look for possible melt pond sites out at the end
of the main line. We found a possible pond and also a possible old ridge site.
Laid out the 100 m tape, 50 m on either side of the peak and marked every 10 m
for an ablation stake/thickness gauge. We used the Finn Bore to drill the
thickness holes-it drills infinitely better than the thickness auger and
besides we didn’t have enough flights for the auger. The work extremely well-we
got all 11 holes drilled and the gauges installed. Tomorrow we’ll go back and
finish up the ablation stakes.
Sunday October
19
Windy (20 kt) and warm (-10C) this
morning. Jackie and I spent most of the day installing the ablation stakes
along the ridge line. It was a fairly straightforward task, but took a long
time because the auger cuts so poorly and most of the stakes are too big to fit
down a hole. So putting in the 11 ablation stakes took up a big fraction of the
day. Bill and Bruce were at work trimming stakes and preparing jumper cables
for the hot wires. Late in the afternoon Jackie and I did a snow survey on the
main line to get an idea of the effects of the drifting. Spent part of the
evening working on snow survey data.
Monday October
20
Warm (-7C) and not so windy. First we
installed the tide gauge at supersite Quebec. The light isn’t great but we
decide to check out the potential multiyear ridge out beyond Quebec. It proves
to be disappointing-too thin, more of a hummock than a ridge. We leave install
a couple of thickness gauges in the holes we drilled, leave a couple of stakes
and head back for lunch. We checked out the ridge on the way to Atlanta in the
afternoon-looks like a good bet for a multi-year ridge. We installed a bunch of
stakes (check Jackies notes) and plan to return to install a thermistor string
and more stakes. While we were working the Good Morning America flight flew
overhead. Upon return to the ship Jackie was paged to meet the media. She is
the main character in a piece on “life on the ice.” She was wisked away to film
dinner. The GMA crew was at the meeting today-so I passed out special treats in
their honor: Macademia nuts, 3 Musketeers and Gummy Bears. GMA was filming on
and off during the meeting. Maybe they got some of us CRREL folks. After the
meeting they filmed Jackie going to bed-at 930. They ended the scene with a
shot from the ice showing the light in her porthole going out. But get this
-they didn’t like her porthole, so they had Dean Stewart turn his light off.
Tuesday
October 21
Its showtime this morning. A day in
the life of Jackie on the ice. I had a early line-”Is the safety on.” Not quite
I’ll be back. We then spent a hour or two driving snow machines in large
circles on the ice. By the third time over the pressure ridge I was getting
bored so I took it full throtle. I got decent hang time with snow machine,
nansen sled and akio. Finally we got to the site where Jackie was interviewed,
while Bill, Bruce and I unloaded boxes randomly in the background. It took a
couple of tries before we unloaded them properly. When the interview was over
they can over to me and said, “OK Don its time for your science piec. What ice
thing can you do in with our star in 5 minutes that is visually striking.” I
decided to drill a thickness hole in a melt pond. They were dubious until we
drilled through and sent water gushing in all directions. They liked that. So
“Michael and I drilled a hole, spattered water everywhere, and then I said
there is the Arctic Ocean. We then measured the ice thickness (2 feet 3 inches)
and talked about how there was 10,000 feet of cold water underneath. Then we
did it 3 more times from different directions. I was profound, brillant and
witty, not to mention good looking, but most likely doomed to the cutting room
floor. We’ll see.
Had lunch with Peggy Hartmann (from
the IMA) who told tales of how “cute” Kathy and I were romancing in the IMA.
After lunch, away from the scrutiny of the media, we went back to work and
installed site Seattle. Seattle is located beyond Quebec near the snow
“mainline.” Seattle is a biggish melt pond with hummocks around. We named two
of the most prominent hummocks St. Helens and Rainier. We are also in the
process of installing an “X” of thickness gauges covering ponds and hummocks.
We have 6 in place and will probably do another 10 or so.
Wednesday October 22
Went out to Seattle this morning to
add some ablation stakes. We only had 8 of the the modified stakes. The ones
that Bruce and Bill cut to fit into the 2 inch auger holes. Seattle is turning
into a maze of ablation stakes with an array of lines across melt ponds and
hummocks. The Twin Otter flew in this morning so GMA could get some aerial
footage. After their flight Andy organized joy ride tours of the floe for the
ships crew and SHEBA scientists. Bruce flew along to get a few aerial
photographs on the digital camera. After missing lunch Bruce and Bill spent the
rest of the afternoon making more stakes, while Jackie and I went to Cleveland
to set up a snow survey line. With all the rafting the snow is a bit deeper
here. Its an interesting site with lots of rafted ice. On the road to Cleveland
(I-80) there is a nice 5m tall first year pressure ridge. Meanwhile, back at
the camp the search continues for a lead so that GMA can show the ice,
atmosphere and ocean.
Thursday
October 23
The Good Morning America crew is
scheduled to leave at 9:00 this morning. The combined Des Groseilliers crew and
SHEBA science team are supposed to meet at 8:30 by the gangplank to do our
hearty “GOOD MORNING AMERICA!” cheer. But guess what. The good news is that we
found the lead that GMA was looking for. The bad news is that is right through
the middle of the runway. At 7:00 Jumper called the bridge and said “Andy,
we’ve got a problem at the runway”. Not quite “Houston we have a problem”, but
close. There was a 4 foot crack right across the middle of the runway. So in
the cold and darkness of the Arctic morning two parallel surrealistic scenes
unfolded: a large group of people
stood shouting Good Morning America, while a small group got construction
material to build a runway bridge across the lead. The CRREL media profile
continues to be high. Through a small amount of manipulation on the part of
Jackie and me, Ed Andreas got to do the GMA introduction. He did a super job.
The bridge worked and GMA left, with one last bit of Arctic excitement.
After those thrills it was back to
business. We finished site Seattle and broke the century mark on thickness
gauge -the count is now at 102. Jackie and I took a quick snowmachine ride to
check out the new lead. There were some frost flowers, but nothing spectacular.
In the late afternoon we all went to the multi-year ridge site - “Tuktoyaktuk”
to install a thermistor string. Thats the last of our mass balance boxes. All
10 have been installed. Not bad at all.
The weather was beautiful. Sunshine
all day, temperature around -20 to -25 C and not a bit of wind. It was one of
those days when it a joy just to be working outside in the Arctic. We saw a
beautiful sunrise and a magnificent sunset. The fact that they were only 5 1/2
hours apart tells us that nightfall is approaching.
Friday October
24
Went to Tuk to finish the thickness
gauge array. Tuk is a nice multi-year ridge. A little on the thin side, but
about the best we can find. We have an array of stakes with two lines crossing
the ridge and one line running across the crest of the ridge. Jackie has the
detailed map in her notes. It felt noticeable colder today. We had to return to
camp to thaw out the thickness kit at one point. Tuk is done-a thermistor
string and a bunch of thickness gauges.
At the end of the day we checked out
the runway lead. It was around 3 m across and closing. There were some frost
flowers on the lead ice, but nothing spectacular. Spent the evening starting to
organize all the thickness gauge data. That is when it didn’t interupt the Tetris
tournament. Bruce is in first place.
Nomenclature plays an important role
in science and we have developed our own. Our radio handle is “CRREL Ice Team”
and of course we have our given names Bill, Bruce, Jackie and Don. However,
today Bill and Bruce explained that we should use pronouns whenever possible.
They explained that Bruce and Bill are always “we”, as in “What do we have to
do now.” Jackie is always “she”, as “She said to...” Don is “he”, as in “He is
still trying to make up his mind.” Finally Jackie and Don together become “it”,
as in “It decided to instrument that ridge and we have to drill 8 m holes.”
Saturday
October 25
Time to fill in the gaps in the
first-year ridge. We’re adding 9 more stakes to give us a total of 20. We did 5
holes and got thickness ranging from 2.5 to 6.2 m. One hole was 6 m of ice,
then .7 m of water, then another block. These ridges are very complicated. Igor
Melnikov brought out his underwater camera, which gave us a chance to get a
long distance look at the underside of the ice. We’re going to try to get some
more video in the next few days and then again in the spring and summer.
We tried out the thickness gauges at
Pittsburgh and Quebec. The generator-Variac combination worked well as long as
the gauge handle wasn’t stuck in the ice. The Variac is on its last legs-I
think its from IGY. We’re going to ask John to bring a replacement.
Under the illumination of the low sun
angle the snow surface had a very interesting appearance. There were large bands
of lighter and darker looking snow. At first we thought that this denoted ponds
and hummocks, but the areas were bigger than those features. After some looking
and thinking we decided that the light and dark were due to the presence of
surface hoar in some places, but not others. In fact when looking towards the
sun the smooth (no hoar) snow surface looked brighter and the the rough hoar
covered surface looked darker. Looking away from the sun it was the
opposite-smooth darker and hoar brighter. This all makes perfect sense
considering surface scattering of the direct beam. The only question is why was
there hoar in some places and not others. There were quite distinct lines of
demarcation between the two. We’ll talk to the met guys and see what they think.
Sunset was beautiful, but eerie. The
sun was a crimson orb, devoid of heat, suspended on the horizon. With the vast
expanse of white with sillouetted ridges and a haze of ice crystals you could
easily imagine that you were on the Martian ice cap. Come to think of it CRREL
should be involved in the planning for manned missions to Mars. If CRREL goes
to Mars, maybe we can leave CEFEMS behind.
After dinner it was time for a
practice night mission. We went out and did a snow depth survey along the “main
line”. It was a beautiful night, a little ice crystal haze, but clear skies
above. At the end of the main line, away from the lights of the ship, we
stopped to watch the aurora and do a little star gazing. There wasn’t much
color in the aurora, but lots of activity.
Sunday October
26
Set the clocks back one hour to mark
the end of Daylight Savings time. It seems like winter-temperature of -29,
clear skies with lots and lots of haze and diamond dust, but luckily no wind.
Forget DST, its almost time for daylight to end! Sunrise and sunset are about
9:30 and 3:30 and we’re losing about 15 minutes a day. This morning it was off
to Baltimore to “finalize” the site. Basically make sure its completed and
ready for the night shift. We took a full set of measurements; snow survey, ice
thickness at stakes, and a core. We also added reflectors to things to make
them easier to find. After Baltimore we hit the road to visit three more of the
stress sensor sites: Wilmington, Odessa and Delaware.
In the afternoon we went through
the same routine at Atlanta. This
time it was added reflectors, a snow survey, and reading the gauges. The
evening was spent organizing thickness gauge information to get ready for John.
Monday October
27
Preparations for our departure continue.
In the morning Bill and Bruce went to Tuk to put in ground wires. Jackie and I
added a 200 m spur road on the main line snow line. You go to stake 5 and hang
a right. We also put in 50 m post all along the main line. Bill and Bruce also
put ground wires in Seattle. Jackie and I attempted to map the pond coverage
from stake 6 to 5 along the main line and then from 5 to 5a along the spur
line. The idea is to see if the ponds return to the same place next summer.
I attended a PI meeting after dinner
regarding what happens in November after we all leave. The key is going to be
to find someone for John to buddy up with, both the thickness gauges and the
snow surveys work best with 2 people. After the meeting it was time for a night
mission to Tuk. Things went well. Doing the snow surveys and the thickness
gauges is very doable as long as you have a partner. I have to get myself a
headlamp, they seem pretty neat. There was a lot of diamond dust in the
atmosphere so it wasn’t the best conditions for star and aurora gazing. I
wonder how much of the “stuff” in the air is due to the ship. If the ship is
having a large impact it could definitely affect the longwave balance during
the winter.
Wednesday
October 29
A warm, windy day. It was “switch”
day. Jackie and I did a set of thickness measurements on the ridge, while Bill
and Bruce did a snow survey on the main line. The ridge is difficult for
thickness gauge measurements because its so blocky. Partway through the
exercise Jackie was paged for a phone call. You never know about these phone
calls, so she went back to the ship to check. It turns out that it was a
magazine reporter that wanted to interview her. Ahh, SHEBA fame and fortune. At
noon Jackie and I did an albedo traverse. It was totally boring. There was hardly
any light. Incident Kipps were around 0.12.
Thursday
October 30
Jackie and I spent the day doing
thickness gauges along the main line and Seattle. It was a beautiful day sunny,
calm and temperatures around -20 to -25 C. Bruce worked on dataloggers and
Campbell programs. I also took a bunch of digital images hopefully for use in
my Orcas Island talk. Bill did some packing and rearranging in the hut. We
actually ate lunch today, since everyone assembled for a group picture at
11:30. After dinner worked on data some, but it was hard to get truly
motivated. Its difficult to believe that in a couple of days we’ll be gone. But
we are making good progress preparing for John.
At 2:30 AM a trick or treat lead
opened up right through the ship. The lead came up the stern following the ship
track and continued beyond the bow out towards the runway. A closer examination
showed that the lead didn’t follow the ships track from the edge of the floe,
but picked it up a few hundred meters from the stern. Got up at 2:30 AM and
helped rearrange power lines etc. Another small crisis at 7:00 AM; the ship was
frozen on the port side and was drifting away from “camp”. Jumper remedied this
situation by hooking the bulldozer to the ship and giving a tug. After breaking
the ship free of the ice on the port side, the ship was tightly moored to the
starboard side. By the time breakfast was over it was business as usual.
After lunch, with Tanneil’s help we installed
the ceremonial Gauge 100. We took lots of pictures. Did a little Halloween
decorating in the cafeteria and put out some bowls of candy. Spent the evening
working on data and getting stuff ready for John.
The science rotation starts today. The
Twin flys out from Deadhorse, circles for 30 minutes and flies home. Its just
too foggy to land. Conditions improve by the afternoon and the rotation is made
right around dinner time. Spent the evening going over things with John.
At breakfast found out that the Twin is in the air, so its time to go home. Packed up my gear and put a duffel bag in a room on the main deck. Cleaned and vacuumed the room, said my goodbyes and thank yous, and had one last unsuccessful try at Tetris. Jackie, Bruce and I, along with 7 others were off at 10:30, with Bill to follow on the afternoon flight. We had beautiful flying weather, with clear skies and great views of the ice. We also had suspense-would we get to Deadhorse in time for the “Jet”. It is going to be close. We landed at 12:50, the Jet leaves at 13:15 and in a scene reminescent of O.J.’s airport Hertz commercials we race from ERA to Alaska Airlines and just make the flight. Its air SHEBA. There are 22 SHEBA folks heading south. All goes well until we hit Anchorage where customs is not ready for us. Everyone misses their flights to wherever, but we get to Seattle by 22:30.
Monday November 3
A nice day of relaxing in Seattle – hit REI and Gameworks.
Tuesday November 4
Stopped by UW and talked to Tom,
worked on ACSYS talk and let Kinko’s be my office away from home. Headed up to
Rosario in the afternoon. Arrived at the resort at 8 PM to find that due to a
mixup my room was not ready. Not to worry, we’ll just put you in the honeymoon
suite. Pretty nice, there is even a remote control for the blinds
Attended ACSYS conference and gave my
SHEBA overview talk, which was warmly received. Spent the afternoon at the
poster session and talking to people about SHEBA. Left for Seattle on the 440
PM ferry to Seattle. Time for a cheeseburger at Kidd Valley and the red-eye
home.
Back home at 1000 AM. Overlapped for 1
hour with Kathy before she had to leave, but she will be back tomorrow. Its great
to be home.
Left Hanover at 11:55 AM on a
beautiful warm sunny day. When I get back I’m going to spend some lazy
weekends. Flights to Boston and MSP were fine, but was delayed in MSP because
of a spectacular thunderstorm. After an hour delay it was off to Anchorage and
a short (10 PM - 5 AM) stay at the Marriott Courtyard.
Left Anchorage at 6:25 AM (half
asleep) for beautiful and cold Barrow. During the stop in Fairbanks someone
walked up to me and said “Excuse me are you Don Perovich, I saw your picture on
the SHEBA Web Page.” Unfortunately it wasn’t a baseball scout, but a fellow
SHEBA participant. Got to the airport in Barrow and was met be Dian who said
“How would you like to go to SHEBA in 15 minutes.” Sure, why not. While I was
waiting for my bags, someone said “Why if it isn’t Don Perovich”. It was
Richard Glenn who was at the airport picking up his daughter who won the state
science fair.
Off in the Otter to SHEBA. It was a
nice, though somewhat cramped two hour flight. Five people and half a ton of
groceries. It was great to be back, but there was a certain Twilight Zone
element. There was strong memories and recognition of the ship and the camp,
but it was all rearranged. The main camp has moved about 400 m north of the
ship and there is a ridge where the old camp was located. Speaking of ridges
they’re everywhere. To get from the ship to the displaced camp you have to
cross a mongo ridge that a pass was cut through. The ridge has some big meter
plus blocks-I try to make some measurements.
After lunch I walked out to camp.
Things have been considerably cleaned up. All extraneous stuff is back on the
ship. The Ocean plywood hut has been abandoned. It was sinking due to the
incredible drifting. One of the met huts is basically below the surface of the
snow. Our hut is fine because it has been moved twice. During this tour I ran
into John and hear that there was an expedition to Baltimore. Sounds great.
Its definitely harder to get to
Baltimore these days with leads and ridges to cross. The leads were closed for
the most part. There was only one dicey area where we had to look for a
crossing. Power through for safety! John and I did the thickness gauges, the
snow survey and downloaded the loggers. He realigned the snow survey, since the
old one disappeared. There is a huge ridge just beyond the thickness line. It
definitely dwarfs the old thick portion near the lead edge. It makes you wonder
with all these big ridges - where were in the fall. Are we getting anonomalously
large deformation this year, or did all of last years features melt during the
summer of 97. Unfortunately when I got back I realized that the “empty” storage
modules sitting on the table were not empty. Hopefully it won’t be a problem,
I’ll just swap them on the next trip to Baltimore
A beautiful sunny morning. Ahh
springtime in the Arctic. Went out to Quebec and Seattle this morning. The
going to Seattle is much more difficult that in the Good Morning America days.
There is some new ice (Feb 6) to cross as well as a couple of rubbly working
areas. We lost a couple of gauges at Seattle and there is a new ridge at one
end, but for the most part its still intact. Quebec 1 has a small crack between
the box and the thermistor string. Retrieved the storage modules from these 3
sites, while John did the mainline ice thickness measurements.
John and I then went on a road trip
with the met guys to Atlanta-just so I could see what is looks like. Its the
most similar of all the sites, though our snow survey line has shifted
somewhat. While the PAM folks were fixing things we zipped over to Tuk, though
zip isn’t quite the word. We had to leave the machines and scramble the last
200 m. It was rubble and ridges all around Tuk, the gauges across the road were
long gone and the new snow survey line (a few days old) was skewed by tens of
meters. But Tuk was still there. You almost wanted to cheer. At the risk of
antropomorphizing - Tuk is one tough site. But they all are. Who knows what the
future will bring, but they all have hung in there for 6 months.
Matthew and John arrived so showed
them around the local sights/sites. During the tour I switched storage modules
on Pittsburgh and the Ridge so we have them all. The Ridge box had to be dug
out since it was buried by the spindrift.
April Fool’s day and John’s day to
head home. Got all the storage modules dumped and the files transfered so John
will have full set to take home. We
went out to the hut so he could talk me through the Jiffy’s, generators, and
Finn bores. During that time Miles stopped by to fill me in on the latest
“incident” regarding the cosy coexistence between Ocean City and Met-ropolis.
Claude interceded. Miles also pointed out that we should formally transfer the
chief scientist “mantle”.
In the afternoon did an albedo
transect more or less coincident with Matthews first snow line. The data and
details are entered in the Kipp.xls file.
Its a beautiful bright sunny with no
wind at all. There is a modest lead that opened yesterday morning about 200 m
off the port stern so off I went to do a little sampling-Leadex Redux. Took
some photographs on the first roll of film just after a balloon photo. The ice
sample was 5.6 cm thick with some frost flowers on the surface. Unfortunately
it was impossible to reach the flowers, but they were nice looking long
dendrites. There was evidence of some rafting in the middle of the lead. The
ice was way too thin and soft to even think about walking on.
After the visit to the lead I helped
Matthew and Jon get rid of their snowmachine boxes. Everyone was disappointed
to find out that in spite of the Polaris boxes they were old machines. Oh well.
Then went out to the hut to start working on the optical gear. Got the ASD
stuff out. It would be nice to run it off of batteries if possible and avoid
the generator.
I took the ASD to the lead in the
mid-afternoon to try and measure some albedos and transmittances of lead ice. I
found that, at least for leads, this is definitely a two person job. By the
time I got everything set up the lead had begun to open and I was dealing with
open water instead of ice. A couple of sightseers came by who I asked to hit
the spacebar for me. Sampled an open water albedo that should be good and made
some transmission measurements at different depths in the water which are
questionable at best. Sky conditions were CO-SDNV.
First science meeting of the shift
tonight. "Welcome to SHEBA. Its springtime in the Arctic. The sun is back,
the frost flowers are blooming, the bears are stirring and the activity at
SHEBA is increasing. But before we look forward and plan for the future, lets
pause for a moment and look backwards into the past, for today marks the
6-month anniversary of Ice Station SHEBA..." I provided goldfish, m+m’s
and macadamia nuts to mark the occasion.
Warm (-15C) and cloudy with light
winds (<5 kt) this morning. After breakfast the ship machinist turned down
one of the arms so I could jury rig a setup for the albedometer. Afterwards it
was off to Pittsburgh. Matthew and Jon showed me their radar, then I did the
thickness gauges at Pittsburgh. I then recruited Matthew to help me do the
mainline snow survey. Matthew brought along his magna-probe which is a fancy
ski pole with a sliding basket connected to a Campbell. You push the probe in,
the basket slides, you push a button, and the Campbell records the thickness.
It only took us twice as long as writing the numbers down. Actually its really
slick and you can do it much faster than the manual way. We just had some
problems at the beginning with the battery disconnecting. The snow main line is
definitely different than in October. Stakes 5 and 4 have been displaced off
the straight and narrow by about 75 and 50 m respectively. It also looks like
stake 3 is new. There are detailed notes on the line in the snowsurvey XLS
file. It now has rubble, ridges, leads and cracks. The was also some shear on the thickness mainline. There
was a 1m offset between stakes 92 and 120. Stake 120 was in rubble.
In the afternoon did some optics at
the portside lead. I selected four sites where I first did Kipp albedos, then
SE590. The sites were within 30 m of one another and give an idea of the
variability in the lead. The new albedometer has some bugs. The newly designed
arm is a bit too long allowing the instrument to sag somewhat. Also the
switching box is totally flakey and doesn’t work well. Sky conditions were CO-SDNV. Took photos of all the
sites towards the end of roll 1. Here are the sites:
1: (1438) Rafted ice with a thin snow
cover. There is 2 cm of fluffy snow mixed with frost flowers. The ice
underneath is somewhat mushy. I=1.11, R=0.78.
2: (1450) Thin black ice-very clear-about
2 cm thick. I=1.00, R=0.08.
3: 6 cm thick ice with a sprinkling of
frost flowers. The top 2 cm was frazil and the bottom 4 congelation. Took a
salinity sample in T82. I=1.14, R=0.25.
4: (1500) Snow covered first year ice.
This ice started growing on Feb 6. There is a 6 cm fluffy snow cover. I=1.11,
R=0.94.
Dream dinner tonight-cheeseburgers,
fries and onion rings.
Spent the morning getting caught up on
notes and doing weapons training. Rene did a nice job of explaining both the
shotgun and the rifle. Had two good shotgun rounds and one OK. Did better than
I expected on the rifle. I had the best shot on the flare pistol, its the
closest to throwing a football.
After lunch 7 of us went out to
Atlanta; Jay, Jim Maslanik, Bob Stone, Neil Fisher, Matthew, John and me. Jim
and Bob, with Jay’s help did their triangle transect measuring KT-19
temperatures and PAR albedos. I did the Atlanta ice thickness line and the snow
survey. The snow survey was interesting because I used Matthew’s magnaprobe. It
worked well-you can generate a large number of points in a hurry. I had almost
300 for the line. Some notes are: Point 144 is at Stake 2, 293 at stake 3.
Stake 3 looks new. The last 10-15 m is in the lee of a ridge. Took a bunch of
pictures on roll 2.
Upon return from Atlanta went out to
the port lead to make some Kipp measurements.There were high thin scattered
cloudswith SDCV-pretty sunny. Results are:
-(1652) Rafted ice site (site 1 from
yesterday) with complete frost flower coverage+a little bit of snow. Frost
flowers are 2 cm deep and almost look like snow only they are too big. I=1.44,
R=1.01. Two site photos after Atlanta pictures.
-Site 3 from yesterday. Moist
surface,partially covered by frost flowers. I=1.41, R=0.80. 2 site photos.
-(1715) Wet mushy new ice. 2 site
photos followed by photo of snow blowing in the lead. I=1.42, R=0.34.
Ended the first roll of film with
shots of camp and port-side lead from the bridge.
Switched to Daylight Savings Time this
morning, so now we are only 8 hours off of GMT. Unfortunately that just drags
us further from local solar time. For our longitude we should be around 11
hours off of GMT, so solar noon here is around 1500. Oh well, I’ll just have to
adjust the optical measurements accordingly.
During morning cleaning of PUV (only a
slight bit of frost), started a new file with some dark readings at the
beginning. Check the clock in Dell 320n notebook to determine UTC offset.
Salinity sample T82 is 7.2 ppt. T156 is 17.5 ppt. Matthew’s sample from Atlanta
is 20 ppt. This was a scraping of surface ice near the small ridge at Atlanta.
I take this to be a good indication of surface melting.
This morning I took several photos of
the big ridge near camp. They were photos 12-16 on roll 2. These were big
blocks, some as much as 2.5 m thick.
Just after noon decided to a snow
albedo profile line along the first 100 of the snow mainline. Sky conditions
were haze and some high scattered cirrus but the sun was shining through-SDCV.
Decided to try the albedometer. The values started off OK, but albedos got to
be too high. I’ll have to check the new switching box to see if there is a
problem. Results are in the Kipps spreadsheet. The patched together arm for the
albedometer is too long and it sags making it difficult to level. I repeated
the run with the old Kipp arrangement-those numbers looked fine.
Off to the lead to try out the ASD and
make some transmission measurements. Matthew came over and gave me a hand. Time
was 1540 to 1600. Sky was partly overcast-solar disk occasionally visible
(PO-SDOV). The ice thickness was 17 cm and there was 2 cm of snow/frost
flowers. I took a core for salinity, which I think it was 9.5 ppt?? (I can’t
find the note). It looked granular and was like mush, it seemed warm and very
breakable. ASD worked well and the measurements went smoothly, though I still
have to look at the data. The scans were
222-224: intercalibration of sensors
225-226: incident
227-228: reflected
228-230: transmitted
231: ignore
232-234: transmitted with surface
scraped
235-236: incident scraped
237-238: reflected scraped
After the optical measurements,
Matthew and I took a look at the snow and frost flowers. The very top of the
snow had a salinity of 2 ppt. In contrast, the frost flowers were 60 ppt and
the slush layer below was 90 ppt.
Had a good science meeting. Its fun to
listen to all the interesting research thats going on at SHEBA. After the
science meeting Dick, Jay and I discussed moving the camp. We all feel that a
big move should only be a last resort. Small moves, as in the past, will be
dictated by leads and ridges. In terms of preparing for various eventualities
we are: 1) looking locally for good pieces of ice (Atlanta looks good), 2)
arranging for Jumper for fly around within 10-20 km of the ship and 3) updating
buoy analysis to get as good as possible indication of where we are going.
Finally, grilled cheese day. I went
wild and had 2 sandwiches. It was great. After getting organized I went out to
Seattle with Matthew and Jon. I showed them around and we talked about where to
survey. Matthew gave me some quick instructions on the smart stick. It could be
a powerful way to look at surface ablation in the summer. I then worked on
thickness gauges and did Seattle, Mainline and the Quebecs. I was a little
clumsy about it. Putting the wire on a reel instead of a spool and making the
alligator clips a little less slippery would help. We need to make it as simple
(and light) as possible for the summer. Looked around in the Seattle ridge for
the missing stakes, but didn’t find them.
By this time (1400) it was bright and
beautiful-sunny skies, no wind and temperatures around -10 C. Now is the time
to do a BRDF! Unfortunately, by the time I got everything ready we were into
patchy clouds. I decided to do a spectral albedo transect using the ASD. Even
more unfortunately the ASD, which worked so well yesterday, was not working
today. It could seem to find any light. I tried various things (turning off and
on, switching batteries, rebooting the pc, switching fiber optics probes, going
to manual operation) to no avail. The dinner horn was a good reminder to give
the instrument a chance to warm up and me a chance to regroup. Straps are the
sled should be made easier to use (or replaced). The hooks don’t want to grab
onto the sled and they’re tough to loosed. Also, add a box for miscellaneous
stuff between the two big box holders
Edited the weekly science report and
e-mailed it to Dick for distribution
Another bright sunny day (high
scattered clouds SDCV). A bit chillier than yesterday. When out to camp to work
on the ASD. This morning it worked fine. Perhaps the problem was that yesterday
I swapped the floppy drive for another battery and in some odd way that
confused the com port arrangement. Drilled a hole at Seattle to get a base
level for Matthew’s survey, data are 240 cm of ice, 26 cm of freeboard, and 19
cm of snow. Showed Ola around Seattle this morning. They are probably going to
move the old Cleveland PAM station out there. The PAM data will make a nice
complement to our mass balance studies.
Afterwards Matthew, Jon and I went on
a foray to try to find the “unknown” orange box that can be seen from the
bridge. I think its Delaware. We went to Atlanta then took off cross country by
GPS and dead reckoning. Thanks to my trusty new binoculars we found it, and it
was Delaware. Swapped the storage modules and helped Matthew and John do a 100
m snow line. Digging snow pits every 20 m we found an interesting feature. At
100 m there was a very heavy snowpack (>50cm) at the base of which was 18 cm
of water on top of the ice surface. Looking at the surface there wasn’t any
obvious explanation.
Got back to the ship at 1330 for the
remote sensing voyage to Atlanta. Waited around for people to congregate, then
finally left at 1415. At Atlanta Matthew, John and I sent up a 100 m snowline.
I measured albedo every 2 m along the line and did some magnaprobing. Albedo
notes are in the Excel file. Jon found an incredible depth hoar vug. Afterwards
it was back to the ship for dinner and data reduction. There was some widening
(to 6-12 inches) of the cracks on the way home.
After lunch went out to Pittsburgh for
some optical measurements. Did both Kipp and SE590 traverses. Descriptions and
results are in XLS files. Took some site photos are roll 3.
Special science meeting tonight to
talk about 1) coordinating resources (snow machines, radios, weapons) 2) red
tags for save me first, 3) aircraft overflights and 4) Smithsonian and KBRW
visit. New locale for the science meeting is the bar.
Its warm this morning around -15 C.
There was more activity around the port side leads and cracks. The biggest has
opened to about 20 m. When out there this morning with Jim,Bob and Taneil and
made Kipp and SE590 albedos, repeated right after lunch and again just before
dinner.
This afternoon it was time for the old
camp cleanup party. Excellent turnout of about 15 people. Part 1 of the cleanup
was a snap. Part 2 was to retrieve 15 frozen in fuel drums. With great
difficulty we got 4 of the barrels out and almost had 2 more, when we hit
water. It was an impressive geyser. and put an end to the days festivities.
Ridge-Pittsburgh AM, optics PM
A brillantly clear morning. A bit
chillier than usual -21C and the strong east wind continues unabated at 25-30
knots. After breakfast went out to the mainline to do a snow survey using the
magnaprobe. Two days of wind has resulted in some activity. The portside leads
have closed, there is some compression in the where the mainline crosses the
February ice and there is one new conspicuous new crack. It runs diagonally
from the ridge towards the ridge line going right between the stake and gauge
closest to the Pittsburgh site. It
continues on heading directly towards the 20 m tower, but petering out before
it gets there.
Right after lunch the plane came in
bringing Jumper, KBRW, and the Smithsonian team (Holly and Jim). Matthew,
Jumper, Jay and I went on a flight in the general area looking for other local
floes. It was a beautiful day and the visible and contrast were superb. For all
that has changed, one thing has remained the same. We have the best looking
floe in the area. There are some other substantial pieces from the original
SHEBA home floe in the area where we could move things to in a pinch. I took a
roll and a half of photos-hopefully getting some good shots of the ship and
camp. Matthew took some digital images.
Afterwards did some optical
measurements from ridge stake 41 back towards Pittsburgh. I had to use the old
Kipps. The new ones were acting flakey. Giving the same readings both upward
and downward. There may be some complex problem where if the signal gives too
high (it was a bright sunny day), then either the instrument saturates or
signal leaks across the switch box. I’ll have to check it out. Took some site
photos of the albedo line after aerial photos followed by shots of the crack.
Dick and Jay Marble, a reporter for
KBRW, showed up and I gave a little tour of Pittsburgh and the met tower. At
one point I was talking about the SHEBA column and Jay said “You have to repeat
that so I can get it on tape.” Who knows maybe I’ll be on KBRW. In the evening
Dick and I briefed Jim Barker and Holly Menino, the photographer and writer
from Smithsonian. A regular media blitz.
Happy Easter! The Easter bunny came
early to SHEBA, at 2:45 AM, same time as Halloween lead, there was two sudden
lurches (around 5.2 on the Richter scale) and some grinding.
Thumpety-thump-thump. After 3 days of 20+knot winds the ice was starting to
ridge near the ship. No big problems though so I got to go back to sleep. One
of Buster's huts, which we have been telling him to move since October, is
doing a slow-motion Titantic manuever. Its listing 10 degrees to
stern-starboard and has around 10 inches of water in one corner of the hut.
After breakfast (serve yourself Sunday
is brunch day) went out to the hut to put together the BRDF instrument and the
IL1700. It took awhile, but I’m ready to do BRDF using the SE590. I basically
dismantled the polarizers for the Stokesmeter. The paint job on the IL1700
brackets is terrible. If I can find some white paint I’ll try to touch it up.
Brunch was a magnificent buffet, with
these incredible chocolate balls-delicous. After lunch I gave Holly and Jim the
tour to the camp. Matthew, John and I then zoomed off to Tuk for thickness
gauges and snow work. Tuk has been hammered big time. There are a couple of
significant of cracks inside the “A” of gauges. In one place a 1 m lead opened
and froze so you can climb into it and look at the ice and snow stratigraphy. I
read all the gauges and did the new Tuk snowline using the Magnaprobe. Stake 1
is still around, but the rest are history. I took a line in the general correct
direction heading towards one of Buster’s sediment traps. I did 200 points at a
spacing of approximately 1 m (72 to the new stake 2). Matthew and Jon did snow
survey maps along our ablation stake lines. Drilled a “zero” hole for the snow
survey line in the thinner ice near the apex of the “A”; stats were freeboard
1.9, thickness 2.05, snow 0.21.
The wind continues-another day of +20
kt winds from the east and our drift to the west continues. After the Monday
morning grilled cheese special, I opened up the new box of ablation stakes.
Time to get the count back up to 100. When out to Tuk-when Jon and Matthew were
already working with Jim and Holly. I put in two stakes to reestablish the
triangle across the road from Tuk. I didn’t put in a ground thinking I can just
go wire-to-wire. I’m not sure that this will work, as I tried without success
to melt out stake 3. The details on the installation are in the thickness file.
Also talked to the Chief Engineer who turned down the adapter on the new Kipps
so that it will fit into the SE590 tinkertoys.
After lunch met with Dick and Jumper
to try to call Andy, but he wasn’t around. We’ll try again tomorrow. Went out
to camp to work on assembling the IL1700. Got that all ready to go. The sensors
are separated by 35.2 cm, which when correcting for the 45o angle should be a
vertical spacing of 25 cm. Then I went out to the young ice just before Quebec
and drilled a ground hole using the 6 inch Finn Bore that I borrowed from Dean.
It worked great-should be useful for the ASD underice measurements. Stats for
the hole are in the thickness file. Buster gave a talk tonight, half of which
was the same as the one in October. The second half was about the lifestyle of
one of last of the old way Innuit. It was extremely interesting.
Installed the IL1700 at Pittsburgh at
1045. Did an intercalibration at site by leaning the wooden rod against the
Pittsburgh orange box so that the cosine collectors were horizontal. The
readings were
1: 2.37E-4
2: 2.53E-4
3: 2.65E-4
4:1.315E-?
There were large
fluctuations during this time as clouds were moving across the sun. There is a
23 cm snowcover and 5 cm of ice
above the top sensor.
Went to Baltimore this afternoon. It
was a major expedition with 9 people and 6 snow machines. We were gone a little
over 5 hours. The road to Baltimore is far more circuitous than in the old
days. Every so often we had to stop and chop our way through a ridge. The PAM
station was buried in snow and had to be dug out. I did the gauges and what's
left of the snow line using Matthew's magnaprobe. The new ridge at Baltimore is
huge. I climbed to the top and looked south for other stress sensor sites, but
to no avail. It looks pretty broken up down that way.
Finished up the weekly report tonight
and sent it off.
In the morning modified the IL1700
setup by getting rid of the spool and putting the connectors in a salinity
container. Then I made a couple of thickness gauges for the Quebec lead. How
nice to have to once again redrill holes in the bars so that the wire can fit
through.
After lunch it was off to the mainline
for some serious albedos. I used the new albedometer and the SE590. The first
pass was with the SE590 starting at Snow Mainline stake 2 heading back to stake
1. The line was about 10-15 m west of the mainline. There were a total of 25
measurements so about every 4-5m .Took some site photos with the SE590 and sled
on top of the ridge. Then I repeated with the new albedometer in tripod
“hopscotch” mode. Details are in the files. The albedometer measurements seem
too high. I need to do an intercomparison with the old instrument and check with
the met and ARM folks.
Worked up the albedo data tonight.
Also looked at the thickness data-not as much growth as I’d like. Baltimore is
only 1.35 m thick. That’s not much for first year. It should be more like 1.8
m.
First thing this morning went out to
Seattle with Ola and Jumper to talk about where to site the PAM station. Then I
went to the ground stand off the stern of the ship to make some se-590 albedo
measurements for Knut. Also made some total albedo measurements with the albedometer.
It just doesn’t seem like it is working properly. The albedos are consistently
too high. I tried flipping it over and both radiometers are properly calibrated
with respect to one another, but the overall reading is too high. Kipp readings
are with SE590 data. Went out to the hut to do an intercomparison between the
the Kipps and the albedometer. These results are in the Kipps spreadsheet.
Basically the 2 instruments disagreed with the albedometer giving values higher
than anyone has measured.
After lunch went out to the Quebec
lead to make some ASD measurements. There were 3 basic sites: lead ice, lead
ice with snow shoveled off and the Quebec 1 pond. Took some site photos. All
the particulars are in the ASD spreadsheet. It appears that we may have had
light level problems at the Quebec site. Lead data looked pretty good. Did the
IL1700 on the way home.
Talked to Dick about the future. On
one hand the buoy tracks and ice edges look good. On the other hand it was a warm
winter and if its an early melt season we could have a problem. Spent the rest
of the evening reducing the ASD data and looking at the ice thickness file. Not
enough growth this winter.
Almost like summer this morning. Air
temperature of -8C and no wind at all. Snowis melting big time on the ship.
This morning put in a 100 spur line off the snow main line at stake. This line
will be used for albedo measurements. After this I put in 2 thickness gauges
into the Quebec lead. Data are in the ICETHICKNESS spreadsheet.
After lunch I took Holly along for
some albedo measurements. Did the new albedo line every 5 m with the Kipps and
every 5 from 0 to 50 and every 10 from 50 to 100 with the SE590. When this was
done I took Holly over to the Blue Bayou and then read the IL1700. Worked up
the optical measurements in the evening.
Another "hot" day, -8 C and
no wind. Last night we either had a bit of freezing rain or some rime icing.
The met people can't agree. All I know is that the UV radiometer had 1 mm of
icy stuff on it this morning.
Taking advantage of the warm weather I read the thickness gauges at Seattle, the MainLine, Quebec 1, Quebec 2, Quebec Lead, the Ridge, and Pittsburgh. Thickness gauge data are all entered on thes preadsheet. The ice is still growing, but not much, maybe 1-2 cm/week. Worked on the data in the evening. It was Karokee night at Ice Station SHEBA.
Used the magnaprobe to do the mainline
snow line this morning. I also did the new albedo spur line off the mainline at
stake 2. The deformation has definitely made the Mainline longer. There are
small refrozen leads beyond Seattle and between Quebec and the ridge line. The
shear between stakes 6 and 5 also lengthened the path.
After lunch worked on the albedometer
and Kipp intercomparison. Things are looking up. The albedometer seems to be
working fine and the intercalibration on the Kipps may be slightly different.
I’m going to do some more calibrations in the morning when there is a nice
uniform cloud deck. After the calibration I talked to John and Jimabout the
road to Seattle and keeping the area as pristine as possible. After which is
was off to the albedo spur line for a 100 m SE590 and albedometer traverse. No
site photos were taken. Results are all in the spreadsheet.
Went to Atlanta to read gauges and do
snow line in the morning. Took CBS out to Seattle in the afternoon for brief
interview and a look at my stuff-gauges and albedos. Not too visually exciting.
Terry came in on the flight and after I was done with CBS I showed him around
the local area.
Escorted CBS to film Matthew and John.
They did great. Afternoon showed Terry albedo line and how to work Kipps and SE590.
Also showed Lyn Symarski of NSF and Curt Suplee of Washington Post around.
Another beautiful day. The Otter is in
the air. Did some last minute backups and packed. Took the first otter flight
of the day. We raced towards shore at an altitude between 200 and 300 feet. We
were looking for bears, but didn’t have any real success. Got to Barrow around
1330. Hung out with Dian and Andy for a couple of hours Stopped at Barrow
Search and Rescue-they have some impressive helos plus a Lear jet. They dropped
me off at KBRW to get some pins. Hit the grocery store for a light supper, then
off to the airport to wait for the jet. Found out from Andy that Jumper went
jumping when the Otter returned to SHEBA. No doubt to the delight of CBS News.
Friday April
25
After plenty of flying made it home on
schedule at 1800, though my bags were lost along the way. The stops were
SHEBA-Barrow-Fairbanks-Anchorage-Seattle-Denver-Boston-Lebanon.
Left home today
on a beautiful spring morning. It was sunny and breezy and just the right
temperature. It was a whirlwind dropoff; Carly at the Cradle and Crayon yard
sale, Dan at Lightning Soccer, and Laura, Kathy and I to the airport. Left at
1100, Leb-Phl-MSP-ANC without a hitch. Not an empty seat on the MSP-ANC flight,
with lots of “tour” people on the MSP-ANC flightRan into Scott Pegau at the
Anchorage airport. Spent the night at the Courtyard by Marriott.
Up early at 0430
to catch the 0630 flight to Barrow. Plane was only half full. Arrived Barrow on
time, but missed the early Otter flight-it left at 0600. I’m scheduled to go
out this PM. I checked into the Top of the World-might as well use my
non-refundable room if only for a while. Meet Terry and Bill when they arrived
at Barrow and got the SHEBA update. It sounded like thing went well for them
and they had a great time.
Talked to Andy
some. The next two rotations are tenuous. For the end of June there is a chance
that the Polar Sea may play a role. Perhaps be an aircraft carrier for the helo
from Barrow. As I suspected that Polar Star is a leading candidate for the
August rotation. However, it will be in drydock at the beginning of August, but
can probably get there by August 25. Andy’s thinking is to split the difference
between the 5 August and 16 September rotations with one in the middle.
Obviously its too early to plan in detail, but this would pose some problems
both for the August out people and for getting people for camp breakdown. We’ll
see what happens.
Woke up at 0500
as I’m still partly on east coast time. First day back on the ship and its
grilled cheese day to boot. Before breakfast unpacked my stuff and checked
various computer setups. Dell is definitely dead and is headed back with Ed. It
could be a while before I get e-mail in my room, but I can use the desktop.
After breakfast
met with Tom, Bonnie and Hajo to plan the day’s activities. They said that
every morning Terry would outline the days activities and they would break into
teams and execute them. Tom and Bonnie are now masters of the helo gear. After
the meeting I dug out my waders and bunny boots. Its getting a little to sloppy
for mukluks. Unfortunately there is no sign of the black Tuf-Bin I shipped.
Andy had said that he thought it was send out on the first flight. This could
be a major problem as it has the calibration lamp, chest waders, hip waders,
crampons and provisions.
Walked out to
camp myself to see the sights. Summer is definitely upon us-the snow pack is
beginning to melt and walking is a series of intermittent knee-deep plunges
into the snow. We now have two huts-the original and the helo-hut. Worked on
rearranging the hut as it was in an ice properties mode. We’re need to police
the area as there are empty and full boxes scattered about as well as a 6-week
residue of ashes on the front porch that are melting like crazy. First thing I
did was fix Laura’s bootjack which had broke in transit. Spent the morning
rearranging and headed back to the ship for lunch. I wore my orange mustang
suit and was sweltering beyond belief-it was way too hot.
After lunch the 4 of us headed out. I switched
clothes and tried out my new parka. Hajo and I did the snow mainline, while Tom
and Bonnie were doing Kipps on the albedo spur. Getting to Quebec is dicey. The
Quebec lead has been working forming rubble and flooded areas. It takes some
looking to find a good, make that OK, place to cross. There are bear footprints
everywhere, up and down the mainline, back and forth through Quebec and over
the ridge. There was a mom and cub set and then a big male set. The male’s
prints were huge! No apparent damage. The Quebec 1 thermistor string broken at
the joint between string 1 and 2, but I’m not sure if that was bears or ice
motion. Tom and I started to do SE590 measurements, but the computer battery
died. We had it plugged into the big battery, but the connector didn’t seem to
be working. All of the connections were worse for wear (optics gear being more
sensitive than coring gear), so some repairs are in order. Called it a day and
took the computer and connectors back to the ship for fixing.
Fog was in and
out all day so flight operations were canceled.
Decided to do
some thicknesses this morning. Beautiful morning-scattered high clouds and no
fog for now. I built a little snow and ice bridge to help traverse the Quebec
lead and got the snow machine out to Seattle. Sometime, probably last evening,
it was visited by bears, a mother and cub. Like all the other bears they walked
along all the stake lines and by the orange box. We could just get bears to
read all the thickness gauges. They probably wouldn’t even need a generator.
Unfortunately, like me they tripped over the guy wires for the pinger. Unlike
me they didn’t trip, they snapped the PVC in half. The bears also broke off one
of Matthews hobos-some impressive claw marks in the snow. With some help from
Bonnie we did Seattle, the Mainline and the Quebecs before lunch. The Otter
finally made it bringing Scott, Sarah and Jinro plus a few others.
Since it was so
beautiful we decided to try for a helo flight. Spent some time planning the
pattern-probably too much time since Terry had left an excellent description of
what we should do. We got the camera loaded and the video and still cameras
mounted on the plate, just in time for the weather to go down the drain. So it
was off to the ice for more thicknesses. Jinro and I did the ridge and the
daily chores; Il1700, UV, and 10 m photograph.
Pierre made a
modified battery connector cable for the Dell notebook-maybe we can do some
SE590 measurements tomorrow. After dinner talked to Claude some about the melt
season and general things. Also talked to Julie who is the lead project officer
for this segment. She works for Judy on the Single Column Model and decided she
wanted to come up to SHEBA, so Dick hired her for a shift. Talked to Jinro some
about SHEBA and Jamstec, and future collaborations. He was surprised our
proposal didn’t get funded-he reviewed it and gave it a definite yes. Entered
the thickness data- essentially no growth in the past week and the snow is
melting.
Today was the last flight of the 1 June rotation.
Its amazing that the runway held together this long. It was an aircraft carrier
today, completely surrounded by water. They had to ferry the cargo from the
runway to the ship by chopper. It will be very interesting to see how we do the
23 June rotation. My box did arrive on the last flight, with 50 pounds of
goodies. Apparently it arrived in Barrow on 28 May, but disappeared in Alaska
air cargo.
Things are getting sloppy here
in a hurry. The low parts of all the trails are filling up with water. The snow
is melting and the meltwater is collecting at the snow-ice interface. We saw
our first pristine melt pond today-just beyond the albedo line.
This morning Bonnie, Hajo,
Jinro and I went out to Atlanta and Tuk. Hajo and Jinro did EM-31 work. Bonnie
and I did the snow lines and mass balance measurements. We got done about 1330.
Tom, Bonnie and I went out to
the albedo line and did Kipps and SE590 visible. The SE590 was acting up. There
seemed to be an intermittent problem with the RS-232 connector. I have a
collection of site photos on the little camera. Pictures of Bonnie and Tom with
the albedo gear.
We had the first science
meeting of the rotation tonight. There was a combination of new and old faces.
Not as many people as I expected. The Japanese TV crew bailed and there are
fewer scientists. Everyone has their own room and there are some empty rooms
and it isn’t very crowded at meals.
Wind
has picked up this morning- 15 kts from the south. We’re moving NE away from
Russian air space. In a few more days the spring FIRE flight operations will be
over. After breakfast the 5 of us got together to come up with our day’s wish
list. Found out there was a Baltimore run- so Bonnie and Jinro went. Hajo is
set for some permeability studies, while Tom and I are going to check out the
bear damage at Seattle and try to fix the broken pinger stand. First I met with
Yvon about the ASD mounts for the chopper. Before anything Tom, Hajo and I went
dumpster diving in the pressure ridge and found 3 sheets of plywood to use as
an ablation screen for our tent. Mind you 3 weeks ago there were plenty of beautiful
sheets of plywood painted white, but now they’re gone. Finally it was off to
Seattle-me driving and Tom riding. Just before Quebec I got hit by a snowball
by Tom. I figured he just thought I was going too fast, but he was waving his
arms. Apparently the ships horn had blasted five times. The radio came to life
with Claude’s whistling call (eerily similar to the way Kathy used to call
Daisy) followed by “Bridge to Don-there is a bear heading straight towards
you.” Following protocol, along with everyone else, we came back to the ship.
Actually it never got that close to us – maybe 200 m. But like all other bears
it was headed straight to Seattle. Jumper and Alain ran it off. We do need to
pay attention out at Seattle.
After
lunch, we tried again. Tom and I brought back the pieces from the pinger stand
for repair. I did the snow Mainline while Tom read the ablation stakes at
Seattle, Mainline, Quebecs. Jinro and I did the Ridge ablation stakes. Looking
at the ablation data I decided to increase the frequency of snowlines and
ablation stakes to every 2-3 days. Not much happening yet at the bottom so
every 6-7 days is fine for now, though I expect that will change soon.
Melting
is really kicking in-we lost 6 cm of snow on the mainline in 3 days. Its interesting
the snow melts, the water drains through the snowpack, gets to the ice surface
and collects in the low areas. The high places are pretty firm, but there are
places where you step and there is 10-20 cm of water under the snow. Grains are
definitely big and round-nice corn snow.
Climbed
the met tower and took a picture. Then I reoriented the camera to look at our
sites, rather that the scintillometer line. I can get Pittsburgh and Quebec in
the frame.After the daily chores (IL,UV,photo) I did some “tent-keeping”.
Brought back a bunch of boxes and ice properties stuff back to the ship
including bandsaw, chop saw and one core tube box. Also took the helohut box to
the Pinkel pile. Note that this box has the probe for the steam drill and also
has a propane bottle in it. Gave Jinro a tour of our data tonight. He seemed
suitably interested and impressed.
Tom
and Bonnie are still having problems with the IR head-it doesn’t want to do
anything. Our SE590 literally had a screw loose,but Bonnie and I fixed it. Dell
#2 is having power problems. It doesn’t want to admit that there is an external
battery attached. The charger is fine, but a battery with an identical
connector is not. I’m using Jerry’s Compaq for now.
I
had planned on starting the day with a visit to Atlanta and Tuk for surface
ablation measurements, but its foggy and snowy. It had snowed some last night.
Instead Tom, Jinro and I went out to the albedo line. Bonnie was working on the
ship calibrating the water level recorder and Hajo was processing some samples.
The albedo notes are in the spreadsheet. In general albedos were a bit higher
from the cm or so of new snow. As we were working, the snowfall increased-the
Compaq got wet, but didn’t seem to mind. I think its slow-or at least spacey.
Sometimes it will just pause for several seconds. Jinro and I finished the
albedo line and I went to check the UV instrument and Jinro helped Tom and the
kipps. Power went out in camp last night so I had to reinitialize the UV
program. Just after the horn sounded for lunch-there were 5 blasts-yet another
bear sighting. This one off the stern. So I picked Tom and Jinro up and we
headed back to the ship to safety and lunch.
After
lunch Tom and I went back out to finish the albedo line. Conditions had changed
dramatically. The sun was coming out and the weather was turning bright and
sunny with patches of clouds. We finished the line and then did every 5 m on
the way back to provide a sunny sky / cloudy sky comparison. Then we extended
the albedo spur another 100 m parallel to the ridge and added a 100 m
perpendicular to the ridge in the middle. Basically the albedo spur is now a T
with a 200 m top and a 100 m bottom. Tom did a snowpit right at the start of
the albedo line. He has the notes. Took a quick look at Seattle and a bunch of
pictures. There is a 20 m lead between our Seattle site and the PAM station.
PAM is around 10 feet from the edge. This is potentially a great lead site.
More
bears, this time a mom and two cubs out at Atlanta. The mom was pounding on the
sled some and managed to break the chimney, otherwise no damage. Ended a roll
of film with a panorama from the tower.
A
little chillier this morning-not quite so much like summer. Temperature was
only –1 or –2, but there were 15-20 kt winds from the northwest. As a result
the snow had a crunchy crust and the ponds had frozen over with 1 cm of growth.
After a free-form breakfast (Sunday is brunch day) Hajo and I, along with Scott
and Sarah went out to the airport lead. We put in 6 thickness gauges along a
line perpendicular to the edge. Notes in the ice spreadsheet. Took some site
photos-some with Hajo pulling the em device and some of Scott and Sarah with
their boat.
After
a late brunch, Tom, Bonnie and I went out to the albedo line. Did the full 200
m with SE590 every 5 m and Kipps every m. Had to wait a few minutes for the sun
to disappear, but after that it was pretty much CO-SDNV. SE590 still has
intermittent flakiness. My guess is that it’s the RS-232 port acting up. The
tipoff to a bad scan is if you have to “double send” if that is the case its
best to retake the scan. Dell computer made it through on 2 batteries. I can’t
figure out why it won’t accept the external battery through plug. One option is
to get a connection that goes directly into the internal battery socket.
After
dinner worked on optical data. Still have some more data to catch up on-maybe
tomorrow night.
Another
grilled cheese morning – ate 1 «, Tom got ¬ and Bonnie and Hajo each got an
1/8. At our morning planning meeting decided to thicknesses. Shortly thereafter
a mom and two cubs showed up headed towards Atlanta. Bonnie, Tom and I did
Seattle in plus the snow line. Hajo and Jinro went out to the airport lead. The
chopper ran the bears several leads beyond Atlanta. The lead at Seattle was
working a little in shear, but crossing to stake 6 was easy. It was fun
listening to the weird noises that the ice was making.
After
lunch, with the bear’s gone, Bonnie, Hajo and Jinro went out to Atlanta and Tuk
to do the ablation stakes and thickness gauges. Tom and I went out to the
airport lead to do some ASD measurements. Managed to get 3 sites done. Here is
the scoop:
Had
a good science meeting tonight – whoppers and rollos. Lots of interesting
discussions about clouds and solar heat and rain and snow. The weekly
temperature range has been –3 to 0 C. Not much but a degree of two makes a
world of difference. A few days ago it was 0 C and melting like crazy. Then we
got 1 cm or so of snow and it cooled off to –1 to –2 C and the ponds froze (2
cm thick today) and the snow firmed up. The snow pack is still big, rounded
grains, but instead of having lots of water, the grains are all frozen
together. This all implies that change is not continuous and monotonic, but
rather event driven: rain, snow, a sunny day.
Weather
looked promising for flying today. Some clear patches to the NW with winds from
the W. After breakfast we went up to the bridge and decided to load the chopper
up with the photo equipment and stand by for the morning. Of course once we got
all the gear installed it began snowing. Worked on yesterday’s ASD data while
waiting.
After lunch it was back to the
bridge for another confab. The usual afternoon mix of sun, low clouds and snow
squalls. Tom, Bonnie and I went out to do albedos. We figured we could get back
to the ship in the time it would take to get dressed if we stayed on the ship.
Sky conditions made the albedo work a little difficult, but we got through it
OK. Still some intermittent flakiness with the SE590 even when using Tom’s
hardware. That narrows the list of suspects down to the two cables-the white
one is the prime candidate. We’ll test it next set of measurements. Did Kipps
along the whole 200 m at 2.5 m spacing. Did visible and uv at 5 m spacing along
the first 500 m. “Cold” conditions continued: the ponds have frozen about 3 cm
and there is 1-2 cm of new snow.
I
woke up a little early this morning with sunlight streaming in my window.
Beautiful clear skies, time to go flying. After breakfast Tom, Bonnie and I
took off on a helo photo flight. We did the big grid at 6000 feet. There were
some areas of patchy clouds along the northernmost leg, but for the most part we
got a real good set of photos. It was good to see that conditions near our
sites are the same as those far away from the ship. 20 miles out there are
nascent ponds, so it isn’t just a ship induced effect. All in all a good
mornings work.
After
lunch the five of us went out to do mass balance work. Bonnie and I did Atlanta
and Tuk in record time then went to help out Tom, Hajo and Jinro. Hajo and
Jinro did an EM-31 line from Stake 5 all the way in. We got done early so spent
some time shoveling snow around the hut and enjoying the afternoon sunshine.
Of
course this being SHEBA things had to change. The evening e-mail came in with a
couple more incendiary messages from the Project Office. One was a list of who
is on what flight-no ice people until the third day. Since Jinro is leaving the
first day we could get into a serious bind if the rotation gets cut short. The
other message was an odd mix of wishful thinking (the runway will stay intact
for 2 weeks) and gloom and doom. My impression is that they have written off
the 5 August rotation and will push everything back until the Polar Star is
available on 24-29 AugustThe expectation is that the entire rotation will be
completed Barrow to SHEBA to Barrow in 5 days. Having spent 5 days trying to
get to the ship from Tuk I’m dubious about the schedule. . There is some vague
arm-waving about alternate methods and added costs fo August 5. I realize that
the purpose of this is to make the folks down south ponder their decisions,
however it is also having a major impact up here.
A
bright, beautiful morning at Ice Station SHEBA. Sunny skies with high clouds,
light winds and temperatures near zero. Its still cold enough that the ponds
are frozen over and the snow isn’t mush. A great day to work outside. In the
morning Hajo, Jinro and I went out to the Seattle lead to put in some thickness
gauges. We installed 5 gauges from the lead edge towards the Seattle main array
tying in at gauge 34. It’s a lot easier to install gauges at 0C than at –30C.
Crimping is easier with bare hands than mittens. The notes are in the thickness
file. I took a few photos of the new line.
After
lunch it was time for optics. Since it fairly sunny we decided to use the
integrating sphere instead of the standard cosine collector. There is plenty of
throughput for this. In fact almost too much. We were running very close to
saturation. There were still problems with the scan transfer. Right now my best
guess is the white cable. These intermittent problems can be the toughest to deal
with. In any event we did an visible albedo pass 0-100, an IR pass 0-100 (first
of the experiment) and a big Kipp set 0-200 plus 100 m spur.
Another
bright and sunny morning at Ice Station SHEBA. Got the word that I’m flying down
to Site 9 after breakfast to swap storage modules. The ice group decides that
the morning will be “free play” and we’ll do mass balance in the afternoon.
Immediately thereafter the fog rolls in putting a hold on my helo flight. I sat
another waiting until 10 AM, then decided to go do the snow mainline. I got
that done in time for an early lunch.
After
lunch it was finally time to fly. On the way to site 9 (13 nm from the ship) we
flew over the new airport. It’s a big piece of 1.4-m-thick first year ice,
probably started growing back in the fall. Its amazing what Jumper did in a
day. There is a 2500 foot main
runway, plus a 1500 foot cross runway-all marked and ready to go. You half
expect to see a couple of 737’s on the ice. Swapped the module with no problems
and headed back to the ship, stopping briefly to drop Jumper and Bob off at the
new airport.
I
did surface ablation at all the stakes out from camp; Pittsburgh, Ridge,
Quebecs, Mainline and Seattle plus all the benchmarks. By the time I was done
(1530) Tom, Bonnie, Hajo and Jinro had finished doing full mass balance at
Atlanta and Tuk. Jinro, Hajo and I went out to the Airport Lead and did
thickness measurements and lateral melt-no measurable lateral melt.
Worked
on data while White Squall was on as the evening movie.
A
bit cloudier and windier this morning. The wind has turned to come from the SE.
Off we go to the NW again. Jinro and I made some ASD measurements this morning
0613A: 1050 Multi-year ice near the turnaround by the
end of the ridgeline. Ice thickness was 2.38, freeboard (Jinro). Snow depth was
8-10 cm. CO-SDBV. I took one site photo from a distance. Jinro has a couple on
his camera with me in the picture. Snow was wet and melting. The measure
sequence was:
Cal:
357, 358
Inc:
359,360
Ref:
362,363
IT:
364,365
After this I did a sequence putting the cosine collector
in the 6-inch FinnBore hole looking down and lowering it in 10 cm steps. I
filled the hole up with chips. The sequence was 10 cm-366 / 20-367 / 30-368 /
40-369 / 50-370 / 60-371 / 70-372 / 80-373 / 90-374 / 100-375 / 110-376 /
120-377 / 130-378 / 140-379 / 150-380 / 160-381 / 170-382 / 180-383 / 190-384 /
200-385 .
After
lunch it was back to the albedo line. Did a full 200 m of SE visible and Kipp.
Tom and Bonnie did IR albedos for part of the first 100 m of the line. Took
some photos of the line (after ASD site picture). Melting has kicked in again
big time. The snow was sloppy and ponds were growing. Details are on the
spreadsheet. Bonnie and I still had intermittent problems with transferring
scans. I don’t know what it is. Theories include a loose connection, the cable
leaking when it drags through puddles and how I push the send button. I think
I’ll try a shorter cable.
The
fad these days is talking in French on the radio. “Timorie, c’est Don. Tom,
Bonnie, Hajo and Jinro allons au Seattle.” It keeps radio traffic to a minimum
A
bright beautiful morning with not a cloud in the sky. Sundays usually start
slowly. There is no formal breakfast, just brunch at 11. Tom, Hajo and I were
up early and decided to go do some mass balance work. I toyed with the idea of
doing some BRDF measurements, but the mass balance has priority. I did the snow
main line and along with Hajo and Tom did full mass balance at Seattle,
Mainline, Quebecs, the ridge and Pittsburgh.
The
original after lunch plan was to have Bonnie and Jinro do Atlanta and Tuk,
while Tom and I did BRDF and Hajo did tracer studies. However, moving the hut
took priority. Our front porch has become a melt pond and the crack in our
backyard has begun to work. Time to move. We’re over by the generator shack, so
getting power shouldn’t be a problem. We emptied the hut, put it onto a Nansen
sled, hooked it to one of the drove it over to the new site. Jumper and Bob
helped greatly in the exercise. By the time we got done it was time for the
evening chores and dinner. There was a great appetizer; shrimp crepes.
Another
bright and sunny day. Can’t beat the weather lately. We decided to take
advantage of it and go flying. Once we mounted thegear on the chopper the fog
rolled in. But its SHEBA and we decided to be perserverant and wait. After the
coffee break the fog had rolled through and off we went. It was a beautiful
flight, only one very minor patch of low clouds-otherwise crystal clear. More
open water, ponds and fragmented ice than the last flight. Ponds were mainly on
the deformed (multi-year) ice. The flat first year was snow-covered and pond
free. Took a whole roll of film, with some aerial shots of our sites at the
end.
After
lunch it was off to the albedo line. Used the integrating sphere since it was a
beautiful sunny day. Did the first
100 m with vis head, full 200 with Kipps. Tom and Bonnie tried to do the first 100
m with IR head, but the battery died. Tom and Bonnie installed the water level
recorder.
After
dinner it was time for the science meeting. It was a good get-together,
everyone brought a plot. Next week its bring an interdisciplinary partner.
Should be interesting.
On
the logistics front the big news was a change in the rotation schedule. Ship
based rotations on 24 July, 24 August, and 24 September. See email record for
the details.
The
beautiful weather has departed- cloudy skies with fog today. Its an ablation
day. Tom and I did surface ablation at the local sites and Bonnie, Jinro and
Hajo did full mass balance at Tuk and Atlanta. More changes on the snow main
line between stakes 5 and 6. There has been additional activity beyond Seattle-ridging
and shear. Instead of being 80 m away in a NNW direction, stake 6 is now 40 m
away in a NE direction from stake 5. There are some impressively big blocks
rafted as well. The ridge line is a morass of deep snow with water beneath.
We
had big plans for the afternoon, but then the fog rolled in, so we adapted to
stay closer to home. We made a series of optical measurements not too far from
the hut. We’ve decided that in addition to the optics work on the albedo line
we going to do a number of sites, a la Barrow 79 to get the optical properties
of various ice types and conditions. I started this in the spring with the ASD
measurements at the new lead, Quebec lead and Quebec 1. A few days ago I
returned to the Quebec lead for a late spring set of measurements. Today we
looked at ponds and unponded ice. The details are :
0616A:
Tom, Bonnie and I did
an assortment of errands this morning. Went to the Chien de Maison to check the
water level recorder, watched Hajo do some dye experiments and then went out to
the Airport Lead to make ablation measurements. We also took a look at some of
the big ice crystals/snow grains. I have a few photos of some of the grains.
Hajo took samples for isotope analysis. But its pretty evident that it is
rotting ice and not snow. Typically it is found on hummocky areas. The grains
are huge and in their early stages show remnants of the ice crystal structure.
After
lunch it was off to the albedo line. Did a complete 300 m of Kipps, first 100 m
of vis and IR SE590. Took some site photos down the line with Tom and Bonnie in
the distance. After scouted around the Quebec lead for snowmachine route. The
old one has eroded because of the lake caused by rafting. You can still walk
across.Took a bunch of photos of the sites. Ended the day and the roll of film
with a panorama from the 20 m tower.
Another
windy day, 20-25 kt from the SE, off we go to the north. After breakfast Dave,
Jinro and I took the helo to Baltimore. The road is closed for the summer. Helo
is a much nicer way to travel. Jinro and I did the gauges, the snow line, and
swapped modules on the thermistor box and the stress box. Conditions at
Baltimore were highly variable. There were places on the FY ice that still had
snow, others that were bare, some that were ponded and a few that had internal
melt ponds. The internal melt ponds were under a couple cm of ice and were a
few cm deep. The snow line was 300 m long. The last 200 m was the original
line, while the first 100 was the portion added during the winter. Got back
just in time for lunch.
After
lunch first it was the snow mainline. The ridge is a major challenge. Once I
went in up to my hip in snow and the underlying water was over my boot top.
Stake 6 continues to move around. Its around 30-40 m from stake 5 to the NE.
After the mainline I worked with Hajo and Jinro doing the ablation stakes. Took
photos of all the ablation sites using the little camera. This will now become
common practice. If the date option worked they should be annotated. The top m of the Quebec 1 thermistor
string has fallen over again-I’ll try a better repair job tomorrow. Melt is
arriving in a big way at Seattle several of the stakes are in ponds now.
We’re
trying to quantify all the various melt processes, but trying to understand
what is going on qualitatively is also quite difficult. Often pools of water
collect under deep snow layers. This water could be from the melt water from the
snow directly above, or perhaps it collects over a larger area. A good question
is what is going on with the solar radiation incident on this. The snow is
large grained and slopping wet, so there probably is decent transmission
through the snow. What thermodynamic role do cracks play. As the snow cover
melts the cracks appear and seem to melt faster than the surrounding ice. This
could possibly weaken the ice facillitating the fragmenting of big floes into
small floes. Another interesting area are the ponds that form adjacent to
pressure ridges (in the subduction zone). These ponds are typically connected
to the ocean via the cracks between individual blocks. Melting seems to
progress fairly rapidly in these ponds with both deepening and lateral growth.
The
SE winds continue unabated, as we move north away from Barrow. This morning was
a collection of odds and ends. Bonnie stayed to get caught up on paperwork.
Jinro and I a) fixed the thermistor string at Q1, b) put in a deep ablation stake
at Q1 and Q2, c) worked on the “pass” to Quebec, and d) made some S,T
measurements in the big pond by the QL rafted blocks.
After
lunch it was the albedo line. Did 200 Kipp, 100 vis and IR. Great diffuse
conditions-CO-SDNV, light sleet. Jinro and I then mapped the 200 m line for
ponds. We marked the start and finish of the ponds as well as the depth every
20 cm. Jinro has the data and is making a new spreadsheet in the computer.
We
got a few cm of new snow last night, giving Ice Station SHEBA a Christmas feel.
The snow was wet and great for making snowballs. It was a mass balance morning.
Bonnie, Hajo and Jinro went off to Atlanta and Tuk to do the full
treatment, while Tom and I did surface
ablation on the main line suite. I had an exciting experience just into the
Quebec lead area. The ice had been working and a small hole had opened up,
froze over slightly and had been covered with snow. It just happened to be
right in my path. Up to the hip on one leg and up the knee on the other and it
was a long way down. What I don’t like is with the magnaprobe you’ve got a 25
pound pack held in place with the shotgun sling.
After
lunch we modified the usual schedule to do Kipps on the albedo line to get the
impact of the new snow on albedo. Jinro, Tom and I took care of this, while
Bonnie and Hajo went to the airport lead to do permeability measurements and
read the stakes. We got done a little early so we worked on our golf clubs for
the minature golf tournament tonight. The golf tournament was lots of fun
meandering through the corridors of the ship. I used an aluminum foil ball and
a club made of a trail marker and a thickness gauge handle. I couldn’t buy a
putt and ended up in the middle of the pack with a 38. Alain won with a 29. I
took a bunch of photographs of various radiometers around camp for the AMS
talk.
Jumper
was able to fly out to the runway this afternoon. His report is that its bad
shape and on the ragged edge of useability. He wants to check it again
tomorrow, but my sense is that he is ready to pull the plug on air operations.
Not exactly good news.
Following the new
Sunday morning protocol I took it relatively easy. Worked on reducing data and
getting caught up on paperwork. After lunch it was out to the albedo line. Did
full 200 m with Kipps and vis, first 100 with UV. There appears to have been
some draining of the ponds-not quite as much water on the line. Evening bad
news is that the runway is dead. Time for Plan Bravo. We had an evening meeting
to spread the word to the science team. Everyone is taking the bad news with
good spirits. Andy is working on solutions.
Partly cloudy
skies this morning, looks like it will be a nice day. It was a mass balance
morning. Tom, Jinro and Hajo did full mass balance on the Seattle run. Bonnie
and I went to Atlanta for mass balance and for instruction in the art of PAM
visitation.
By lunchtime the
skies had cleared even more so we decided to go for a helo flight. Beautiful
flying weather. We got the full box at 6000’ and at the end of the flight made
several video passes at 6000, 5000, 4000, 3000, 2000 and 1000’. This should be
good for camp mapping.
News from the
beach is good. Two options are being seriously pursued-the Polar Sea and the
Super Puma. If it’s the Super Puma we will try to reduce the inbound load. We
will ask people to minimize their programs if possible and may have to postpone
some stuff until August 5.
Broke my SHEBA career phone call record in one day. Called
Vicki twice this morning, talked to Andy this afternoon, talked to Dick twice
this evening. Dick and I are setting science priorities in case we go with the
Super Puma. Its 10 times more expensive than the Twin-if we did the same
rotation it would be half a million dollars.
Talked to Dick at
6:30 AM. Sounds like the Super Puma is the more likely option-so we’ll look for
ways to reduce the number of flights. It’s a gorgeous morning. Beautiful
sunshine and not a cloud in the sky. A great day for Tom, Bonnie and I to do
BRDF measurements. We got off to a late start because I was slow. I asked
numerous questions about rotation issues and talked to Claude and Jumper about
the science options. Finally we left at 0940. Just as we were setting up an
announcement came over the PA system that the Polar Sea will be doing the
rotation. So much for insider information and a morning of planning, but that’s
SHEBA. Details are sketchy, but the Polar Sea is supposed to take on passengers
Friday morning and then set sail for SHEBA. When she is in helo range the
personnel exchange will begin-probably Sunday or Monday depending on ice
conditions. I also learned that the Polar Star is looking good for the 5 August
rotation. Her drydock appointment is being moved up. According to Claude she is
scheduled to arrive at SHEBA on 6 August. People will be exchanged and she will
set sail for Barrow. She will return at Ice Station SHEBA in early September
for another rotation.
Did 2 details
BRDF measurements near the hut. One site was drained white ice and the other
was a melt pond. Details are in the ASD file. Beautiful conditions for the
measurements BC with not a cloud in the sky. Details are summarized in the
spreadsheet.
In the afternoon
we did the albedo line. Since it was sunny we used the integrating sphere and
all of Bonnie’s electronics. Did 200 m for Kipps and first 100 for vis and nir.
Jinro and I did the melt pond survey for the full 200 m. Took a site photo on
the Nikon for each SE site. There seemed to be a fair amount of drainage. The
pond area appears to be smaller. He will put the results in a spreadsheet.
Beautiful morning
with light winds from the north. It’s a mass balance day. Jinro and I are doing
surface ablation on the Seattle set, Tom, Bonnie and Hajo full service at Tuk
and Atlanta. We’ve retired the Magnaprobe, the mix of snow and ponds makes for
too much notetaking for the magnaprobe to be useful. We did the snowline out
and started reading stakes on the way back in. Looking to the north we could
see a wedge (high on the leading edge) of clouds come in. In the course of 45
minutes we went from unlimited visibility so the thickest fog of SHEBA-couldn’t
see the ship from Pittsburgh. Jinro took photos of each site.
In the afternoon
Hajo and Jinro went off to do some permeability studies, while Tom, Bonnie and
I did optical measurements at the Quebec lead. Did 2 sites with ASD and SE-deep
pond plus rotting FY ice. Notes
are in the spreadsheet. Took a couple of site photos.
A little cloudier
today, but still pretty nice. We got around 0.5 to 1.0 cm of new snow last
night. It gave the surface an odd looking appearance. Parts were brighter, but
other portions were more or less unchanged. Pond surfaces are frozen as are
smaller leads. Bonnie and I went to Maui with Dave for our final PAM exam. It
was a snap. After that we checked out the Maui lead. Lots of brash and chunks
in it. There was also a fair amount of thin ice (only a few cm) piled up. It
must have grown over the past few days. Did a quick and dirty CTD profile in
the top 2 m. There was freshening near the top, but it was uniform below.
After lunch it
was off to the albedo line. Pond drainage was evident and the ponds were frozen
over with 0.5-1 cm of ice. Hajo’s measurements should provide some good
insights into changes in permeability. I think there are two factors at work in
the sharp drop in pond levels; drainage due to increase in permeability and
cooler weather decreasing the input of melt water. Ponds are deeper and there
is more surface topography. Jinro and I did another pond mapping profile along
the line. Did full 300 m for Kipps and first 100 m for vis and nir. Took site
photos of the vis sites using the digital camera.
Brief meeting
tonight so Jumper can get the weight information for the helo flights. Latest
source of contention regards where the beach is; Barrow or Nome?
Same weather
pattern. The ponds continue to drain and with sub-freezing temperatures they
are not being
It’s a mass
balance morning. Jinro and Hajo did the surface at doghouse, Atlanta and Tuk.
Tom, Bonnie and I did the Seattle suite. The magnaprobe has been retired for
now. The combination of snow and melt ponds required so much notetaking that it
was easier to do by hand. Tom and Bonnie did the snow line while I started the
ablation stakes at Seattle. Took a bunch of site photos on the Olympus. Stake
20… at the Quebec lead is dead. There was « a meter of surface flooding from
the big pond by the ridge and the stake completely melted out. I still did ice
thickess by measuring the pond depth and then the height of the gauge above the
water surface. By hustling we were able to get done by lunchtime. Tom fell into
a deep melt pond and got both boots wet. Bonnie stepped into the side of the
hole that got me and filled up one boot. I however remained dry, though I did
manage to shock myself doing the thickness gauges. I got too efficient for my
own good.
We decided to do
some site specific optics in the afternoon. Tom, Bonnie, Jinro and I went out
to the airport lead with the ASD and SE.
We did 2 sites: one was the FY ice and the other was the lead.
Site
A: Airport first-year ice. Hs=5 cm, Hi=153, Fb=135. There was lots of biology
at the bottom of the core. Scans were:
Cal: 264,265,266
Inc: 267, 268
Refl: 269, 270
IT: 271, 272,273
(spectra look odd-shifted to brown-instrument may have been sideways
IT: 304,
305,306,306 repeat with more floation on the arm
Profile looking
downward with depth every 10 cm from 20 to 160 (scans 274 to 288). There was a
problem with this measurement since the detector slipped up the rod – use hose
clamp in the future.
Site
B:
Have an ice
physics group meeting in the evening with Jinro, Hajo, Tom, Bonnie and me to discuss
what we are doing and what we are missing. There was quite a bit of discussion
regarding how much in the way of physical properties characterization we can do
in support of the optical work. Tom is interested in filtering samples for
particulate analysis. Hajo and I felt that if you were going to do that, then
what about the biology and air bubbles. The issue was left somewhat unresolved.
We may take cores and put them in the freezer. We also came up with a list of
things to do: 1) take short cores, 2) fly ASD in the chopper, 3) do smart stick
lines across a ridge, along the albedo line, along the snow line and at
Seattle, 4) fix the Ridge site, 5) do Kipp albedo lines at different sites, 6)
try to find another lead site, and 7) select some ponds for time series
measurements.
Got up early to
call home for Laura’s half birthday. Laura was at a sleepover at Suzy’s, but I
talked to Kathy, Carly and Dan. It was great to talk to them all. Got the word
this morning that the Polar Sea sailed at midnight. ETA is Tuesday night or
Wednesday morning. After breakfast Tom, Jinro and I did the first ever helo ASD
mission. Details are in the spreadsheet, but it seemed to work pretty well.
Ideal incident conditions – CO-SDNV and very little change in incident. Made 3
passes at 100, 400 and 1000 feet. As expected spatial variability in incident
decreased with altitude.
Did the albedo
line in the afternoon. 200 Kipps, 200 vis and 100 nir. For the first 100 m used my
controller and camera head with the IBM. Second 100 used Bonnies controller and
my camera head. We had problems on the first 100, but not the second. Latest
theory is that my controller is screwy. For the first 100 there was no
tell-tale evidence of failure.
It was an “easy-going”
Sunday morning. Sundays are slow with most groups taking at least part of the
day off. Our policy is that you can do what you want in the morning and we try
to get done a little early in the afternoon. Worked on data trying to get
caught up on the ASD files. After lunch it was mass balance. Tom and I did
surface measurements on the main line-Seattle suite. Also made some CTD
measurements in the Seattle lead. Definite surface freshening and heating. Big
notch as well, though no lips have broken off.
What a difference a day makes. Yesterday the ponds
were frozen over and had been draining and the snow/ice surface was firm and
frozen. Today the melt season is once again in full swing. It’s a sloppy mess
today. Winds are from the SE, with a mix of flurries, sleet and a light mist.
The ponds are filling, the snow is slush and the ice is rotting.
Flew out to
Baltimore this morning for mass balance etc. Swapped both storage modules. Next
time need to take a new battery for the stress box. Tried to use the battery
for the mass balance, but it didn’t work very well. It was slow and couldn’t
melt out a couple of the multiyear gauges. Quite a bit of surface meltwater at
Baltimore. Did the 300 m snow/melt pond line. The first and last stakes are lying
down in a ridge, so it takes a little looking. There were deep ponds on the
flanks of both ridges.
While I was
flying Tom and Bonnie made a couple of sets of uv-vis-ir albedo measurements.
Hajo was working on permeability studies and Jinro assisted MJ in building a
bridge across the Quebec pond.
It was an albedo
afternoon. Did 300 m of Kipps, 100 of visible and 70 of ir. Jinro and I also
did the pond mapping survey. For the visible measurements we used my camera
head and Bonnies controller along with the IBM. That combination seemed to work
great. My controller appears to be having com port problems. Also the Compaq
appears to be having com port problems. So there may have been 2 intermittent
bugs in the system.
How is this for a
paper or talk; “The many faces of melt.” There are ponds, rotting snow, rotting
ice, ball bearing ice, shards of ice and today we saw honeycombed ice. There
was a flat, thin (few mm) surface layer of ice. Underneath it was a sparse
honeycomb of ice. The honeycombs were a few cm across and 5-10 cm deep in a
regular looking pattern. I took some photographs just before the
CRREL/UW/UAF/Frontier team photo.
All in all a busy
day. I was taking a relaxing break before the science meeting. Enjoying a root beer
barrel and a Spenser book when I felt something funny between my front teeth. I
thought it might be a piece of plastic or something from the rbb, so I got out
the floss and toothpick. It wasn’t plastic, but shards of filling. One of my
front tooth fillings fell apart. I managed to avoid fainting and convinced
myself that losing a filling isn’t any worse than chipping a tooth. We’ll see.
Good science
meeting tonight. We talked about how much of what we are seeing is event
driven, rather than a continuous function. MJ gave his report in rap. M+M’s and
smarties for a treat.
Beautiful morning
when I woke up, but during breakfast clouds moved in from the west. So rather
than flying we did a mass balance morning. Jinro and Hajo did surface measurements
at Tuk, Atlanta and the doghouse. Tom, Bonnie and I did full ablation on the
Seattle-Mainline suite. That’s quite a job and I don’t look forward to it. With
the clear skies last night the surface was reasonably hard and there was a m or
so of ice on the smaller ponds.
After lunch sky
conditions improved to broken clouds with a ceiling of 2000 m. With the
rotation in the works this was our last chance to fly for a couple of days so
we decided to go for it. Did the full 100 nm grid at 6000 feet. Considerable
changes since the last flight. There was more open water and the floes were
definitely more broken up. Many of the leads looked new (new leads having
distinct edges with the pieces easy to put back together visually).
Better progress
for the Polar Sea today. As of 8:00 PM they are 201 nm from SHEBA. I got a fax
from Dean regarding some changes to the batting order. They had a total of 8
switches. I talked to Alain and we were able to address most of their concerns
with only 3 switches.
July started out
with miserable weather; 30 kt winds dense fog with a bare hint of rain, or at
least condensed fog. The 8:00 AM report has the Polar Sea 150 miles from SHEBA.
They’re hoping to cover the last 50 today and be ready to start rotating people
tonight. Jinro stayed in to pack this morning. Tom, Bonnie and I went out to
the hut area to do some ASD work-two sites bare white ice and a melt pond.
Incident conditions were ideal. I drilled the pond hole and took around 10
minutes to get stuff together. In that short time a false bottom formed, one
that was thick enough that I had to drill it. Amazing. Site details are in the
spreadsheet.
In the afternoon
it was off to the albedo line. Did 200 m of Kipps, 100 of vis and around 70 m
of nir. The nir battery died again. Tom is going to wire an adapter for the my
rechargeable batteries. That will give them ample power for IR measurements.
Again the incident conditions were wonderful-nice steady, diffuse incident.
Tower film was at
the end so I added a new roll. First two pictures are of Tom, Bonnie and Jinro
on the ground. Todays melt was very evident. Places that still had a little
snow/slush were bare ice now. Here is some speculation – on cloudy foggy days
you get a fair amount of melt-but its at the surface resulting in large part
from the turbulent fluxes, particularly condensation of the fog. On sunny days
the solar radiation induced melt penetrates more and you get rotting and
disintegration of the surface
Mass balance morning.
Tom and I did the Seattle – Mainline surface. The rotation is beginning!
Choppers from the Polar Sea in the air under some pretty foggy conditions. Was
called to the bridge at 1100 AM for a call from the Polar Sea – it was Dean and
Jamie. The connection was terrible and I couldn’t understand anything. There is
some confusion between the two ships regarding the batting order for the
transfer.
Stayed close to
home in the afternoon photographing surface melt features for “The Many Faces
of Melt.” Jackie arrived somewhat unexpectedly shortly after dinner with lots
of stories about her looonngg trip.
In the morning
Jackie, Hajo and I put in a ridge ablation line consisting of several stakes
that we will string rope between to make surface height measurements. Hajo also
used the smart stick to survey in the stakes. Notes are in Jackie’s log.
In was albedos in
the afternoon. All measurements worked very well. Did 200 m of Kipps, 100 vis
and nir. Perfect sky conditions CO-SDNV, completely uniform. Jackie and I did
melt pond survey on the line. Data are all entered into the appropriate
spreadsheets.
Happy 4th
of July! It’s a mass balance morning and since it’s the 4th of July
the afternoon is free. Tom, Jackie and I did the full program on
Seattle-Mainline, while Bonnie and Hajo did Atlanta-Tuk. Saw some fascinating
crystals that were forming in a false bottom. Took some pictures on the Olympus
after a panorama of Seattle. Also took the Seattle box off of its stand before
it fell over. With various side issues we didn’t get the line done before
lunch. After lunch Jackie and I went out and finished the line and did the
afternoon chores. Played some softball, first some catch then everyone (around
8 people) got a few swings. I put 2 over the ridge in right field.
The last chopper
from the Polar Sea left the Des Groseilliers at 3:00 PM ending the rotation.
All the gear and all the people are here only a week late. Pretty fine
improvisation on Andy’s part.
After dinner we
had the SHEBA welcome meeting I spoke very briefly and Rene and Dean did a good
job of presenting the ship and logistics perspectives.
Its raining
buckets out, along with a 25 kt north wind. Fortunately Sunday morning is
catchup time, so I get to stay inside and organize data. Jackie had a New York
Times that was only 2 weeks old, so I got to do some Sunday morning newspaper
reading.
After lunch Tom
decided that it was raining too hard for his equipment, so he stayed in. Hajo
went out to Sarah’s Lead with Jackie and I as an escort. New rule is that no
one travels alone. Jackie and I then did the albedo line, Kipps only, in the
rain. Aside from having the wrong gloves it wasn’t too bad. The gloves are
windstop, not rainstop and got soaked and very cold. My new Gortex jacket and
pants worked great. Melt ponds were high with local flooding in the low lying
regions. All in all we got an inch of rain for the day. Quite a bit for a
desert.
The rain has
stopped and the sky has cleared. It’s a beautiful morning, but on the horizon
you can see the fog on its way. With the clear skies the temperature dropped
and the ponds are frozen again. Set in motion the arrangements for a helo photo
mission. Unfortunately the fog rolled in and it’s a mass balance Monday
morning. After 1.5 grilled cheese sandwiches for fortitude Jackie, Bonnie and I
headed out to Tuk and Atlanta for the full mass balance suite. I haven’t been
to Tuk in a couple of weeks and its impressive how much the surrounding rubble
has melted. Have an Atlanta site photo with Bonnie and Jackie in it plus some
pictures of the refrozen ponds showing some interesting ice features. Some
ponds have bullseye patterns in the refrozen ice indicating how the pond
drained overnight. Looks like about 3 cm of drainage. Working hypothesis is
that drainage is relatively constant, but the input (meltwater) is variable.
Spent the
afternoon doing 2 ASD sites. Site A was drained white ice with “polar bear fur”
and Site B was a melt pond. Details are in the spreadsheet and Jackies notes.
Did have some problems with the intercalibration scans. It may take a little
imagination for the transmittance. Did 2 hole profiles at Site A, one with the
hole open and the other with a towel stuffed in it. The hole was free of slush
and chips in both cases.
Science meeting
tonight. General summary and discussion of SHEBA science. Next week’s
assignment is one plot per person. Milky Ways and Hersey’s dark.
Sky looked good for a helo albedo flight with a nice uniform cloud deck. So I made the arrangements to go after the chopper slings Jamies helo hut. By the time we loaded everything up the fog had rolled in and the deck was down to 75 feet, so we postponed until after lunch. Jackie and I then went out and did the ridge surface ablation line.
After lunch we
took another short at the helo albedos. Conditions weren’t great but we were
able to do a pass at 100 and one at 200 feet. The flight path was somewhat
complicated because of ship drift, but the basic idea was a box 3 nm on a side
flown at 60 nm with a photograph and an albedo every 10 seconds. We used one of
the mystery rolls of film. Figured we didn’t have much to lose. I don’t expect
a one-to-one correspondence between photos and albedos. I probably missed a
couple of photos, but with a little work we can match things up. There seemed
to be a bit more variability in incident than the first flight.
After the flight
we raced out to the albedo line and did 200 m of Kipps and 100 m of vis under
CO-SDNV incident conditions.
A windy, but
beautiful morning. Generally clear skies with some scattered high clouds. Time
for a helo photography run. Tom, Jackie and I did the full helo mission at 6000
feet. It went great. Lots of changes in the ice cover. See the log for details.
By the time we got back it was lunchtime.
After lunch it
was mass balance. Jackie, Bonnie and I doing the full suite on the
Seattle-Mainline run and Tom and Hajo on Tuk-Atlanta surface ablation. Lost a
couple of melt pond stakes at Seattle. It seems that all the pond stakes will
melt out. We’re working on a plan B – benchmarks and a surface survey line
followed by a lot of drilling in the fall. First “chef” measurements at Seattle.
It’s 1.4 m with a nice taper. Jackie has the notes along with the quickie CTD.
On the way back
to Pittsburgh we stopped to watch the C-130 flyover. It came straight down the
albedo line at 150 feet. Very impressive and should be a great dataset for intercomparison.
Also lost a
snowmachine tonight. Christine was driving 50 m from the Blue Bayou to the
logistics hut and got into a deep melt pond. She jumped off and the machine
started to sink, but Scott, Sarah and Karen were able to hold it in place until
Dean and others could drag it out. Worked on data and watched Indy Part II.
Good data, bad movie.
After crepes it
was off to Baltimore. Beautiful morning, no wind and partly cloudy skies. Saw
two seals on the way. Dean, Jackie, Ola, Kerry and I went. Top two stress
sensors have melted out, but the deep one is still OK. We brought back the 2
melt-outs plus all the cable.There has been considerable drainage around
Baltimore since my last visit. You can see areas that used to be ponded, but
have drained. Lost 3 more sensors that were in melt ponds. Two were adjacent to
the thermistor string, but there is still one left there. One of the
melt-throughs was teeming with biology. There were long globs of brown stuff
clinging to the crossbar.
It was albedos in
the afternoon. Did 200 m Kipps, 100 m vis and nir. Also did a 200 m pond map.
The ponds seem to be better defined. By that I mean deeper with higher sharper
walls. It was more difficult dragging the sled through the ponds. Albedo notes are
on the spreadsheet.
Foggy at first,
but the fog quickly dissipating to give a beautiful morning. High scattered
clouds and light wind. Mass balance morning. Tom and Hajo full treatment on
Tuk-Atlanta. Bonnie, Jackie and I doing surface measurements and maintenance on
Seattle-Mainline. Did lead measurements at Seattle. Top 60 cm was fresh and
hot; +1.1 C. Nice shelf is beginning to develop on the edge. Added a melt pond
survey line at Seattle. This is 2 stakes with a line hung between them. The
line is marked every half meter. At each point we measure the distance from the
ice to the string and the pond depth (or rotted ice). Jackie has the initial
data in her log. Took an extensive photo panorama at Seattle. Aside from the
Mainline, it seemed like there was less “bear fur” than the day before. Perhaps
it is breaking down into a more granular form.
Did a ton of
optical measurements in the afternoon. Jackie and I used the ASD, while Tom and
Bonnie did SE-590 visible and nir. We did a survey of local ponds starting with
the Quebec lead (which had a lot of biology in it). Also did some white ice
cases for comparison. For the ponds we did the standard I, R, T plus upwelling
measurements using the underice detector. Typically we would make 3 measurements
with the underice; one just above the ice, one just under the surface of the
water and one sitting on the surface of the ice. It was a long afternoon, but
we collected a lot of data. Took site photos of all the ponds. Maybe we’ll get
some insight as to the pond color. The importance of the ice underneath is
evident. Some ponds look so dark that you’re afraid to step in them, only to
find out that it’s only 10 cm deep. Our working hypothesis is that the
beautiful blue-aqua ponds are typically found adjacent to ridges and are
reasonable deep with bubbly ice below.
Spaghetti with
meat sauce for dinner and Indiana Jones and the Last Crusade for the evening
movie. Doesn’t get much better than that.
Another beautiful
morning. Found out that a helicopter search mission for the lost balloon was
being planned by Taneil. Robert, the pilot, scaled back the passenger list and
Rene suggested that my approval was needed. My contribution was to get as good
an estimate of the relative position to the ship as possible and to look for
any man-made objects and note there range and bearing from the ship.
After breakfast
the haze came in scrubbing the flight. Jackie and I went to Sarah’s Lake
(airport lead), while Tom and Bonnie chainsawed a hummock. While at the lead we
did mass balance, lateral ablation, wall profile and quick CTD. Did the wall
profile using crampons which worked great. We need to figure out a way to get
the bottom part of the profile. We then went on a rowboat ride around the lead.
It was very interesting, lots of shelfs with surface undercuts of 1 to 1.2 m.
Being an odd
numbered day it was albedos in the afternoon. Did 100 m SE vis and nir plus 200
m Kipps. Jackie and I did the pond survey on the albedo line. After that we
measured the ridge surface ablation site and installed the line and measured
the stake 81 pond profile.
Around camp the
pontoon float has been moved under the gangway and a few bridges have been
build across some of the deeper pond notches. Jamie run his auv under Hajo’s
line and will probably do the ridge tomorrow.
Spent the morning
getting caught up on paperwork, then off to do mass balance in the afternoon.
Tom and Bonnie did surface measurements at Atlanta and Tuk and surveyed the
stakes. Hajo, Jackie and I did the Seattle-Mainline. Jackie and I did the mass
balance and Hajo did his EM-31 line. Major wells have begun to form around the
stakes so we shoveled some ice in. Stakes in ponds are rapidly melting out. Did
wall profiles and CTD in Seattle lead.
Almost a good
cloud deck for helo albedos, but just a bit too spotty. Tom and Bonnie did
laser surveying on Seattle-Mainline. Jackie and I did maintenance, resetting
boxes, bringing in hobos and carefully filling in wells. I looked like an
Arctic gardener with my pail and trowel tending to my ablation stakes.
In the afternoon
it was the albedo line. Bonnie and Tom were still surveying stakes so Jackie
and I did 200 m of Kipp plus 100 of vis. Then Tom and Bonnie did 100 of IR,
while Jackie and I did stake gardening. The radio was alive all afternoon with
traffic regarding search and rescue operations for the AUV. It flipped out and
went zooming off, luckily colliding with the Atlanta ridge. Jamie et al. Plus
Dean and Paul were able to recover it after much work. Good science meeting
tonight, with everyone bringing a a graph I posed the question for the next
meeting “The Surface Heat Budget-discrete or continuous?”
Happy Bastille
Day. We’re all to wear red, white, and blue. I was solid in white and blue, but
the red was a little meager. The morning started off with an annoucement in
French. While I’m far from fluent, I recognized that the entire crew was to
meet in the cafeteria at 730 AM. Needless to say this was a bit unusual.
Apparently the green team wants more time at home and has proposed rotations on
15 August and 18 September. Check e-mail for details.
Mass balance day.
Jackie and I did surface measurements at Seattle – Mainline plus lead
measurements and “gardening” around the stakes. Tom, Bonnie and Hajo did full
treatment at Atlanta and Tuk plus some EM-31 work.
In the afternoon
we all went to Tuk, Hajo to continue the EM-31 and the rest of us to do optics
on the dirty ice. We did 4 sites with the ASD, clean ice, dirty ice, a bright
blue pond and a dark pond. All the albedos turned out great, but two of the
transmitted were squirrelly. The underice detector has had some intermittent
problems. It may need to warm up more. Be sure to check the scans as they are
made. All in all a busy and productive day.
Evening bridge
visit was a discussion of potential rotation plans.
Though the
weather was somewhat marginal we decided to go for it and try a helo photography
run. Tom, Bonnie and Hajo flew. Jackie and I went to the albedo line for some
stupid stick surveying. Did the first 100 m. The flight went well, with some
fog on the north leg, otherwise OK-again at 6000’.
After lunch it
was off to the albedo line. Did 200 m Kipp plus 100 vis and
nir. After
albedos Jackie and I finished the surveying by doing the last 100 m of the
line.
Nightly bridge
visit was more talk of rotations and permutations. Afterwards received some
e-mails from the shore confirming that rotations are proceeding according to
plan; August 5 and September 3. Check e-mail log for some interesting reading.
Mass balance
morning. Bonnie, Jackie and I doing the full suite on the Seattle-Mainline:
surface, bottom, lateral and surface lines. We had the routine down well and
made it home for lunch. Cracks are coming out all over. Every crack (or
indignity)that the ice has suffered through is now evident as the snowcover and
the thin ice in the cracks melt. As the melt occurs the floes can just start to
fall apart. This is how the ice cover goes from the big slabs to the complex
mosaic of ice and open water with lots of floes. Getting across the Quebec Lead
was quite a challenge. I’m not sure how many more times we will be able to
cross at this location. There also are several crack around the Quebec,
Mainline, Seattle area. I hope this all stays together.Used the Nikonos for the
first time to take some pictures of the Seattle lead and the false bottoms in
the crack by Quebec 1.
After lunch took
advantage of the uniform sky cover to do an aerial albedo survey. We could only
do 1 altitude (100 feet) since the deck was low. Did 1) a pass over the albedo
line, 2) a 3 km on a side box, 3) a run over a lead for calibration, and 4) a series
at increasing altitudes over the middle of the albedo line. At the end of the
flight took some photos of Seattle, Mainline, Quebec, and the Ridge. Should be
some good pictures. Details are in the spreadsheet.
After the flight
it was more subroutines. Bonnie and Hajo went to the Airport Lead. Jackie and I
did the ridge surface ablation line and surveyed the melt ponds on the ridge.
Tom looked at cryoconite holes. All in all a very productive day. We polished
off quite a few subroutines.
A bright
beautiful sunny morning. It would be a nice day for a helo flight, but we did
one just two days ago. Instead I decide to go for some “bear fur” BRDF’s. We
measured 2 sites with bear fur of different maturity. Used the ASD for the
observations and measured spectral albedo, BRDF, and transmittance. By the
transmittance measuremets the clouds had begun to come in and we were under
PC-SDV conditions. This should also give a nice sunny sky/cloudy sky
comparison. As part of BRDF measured direct/diffuse of incident. While it was
blue sky around the sun there were clouds to the SE.
After lunch it
was off to the albedo line. Did 300 m Kipp, 200 m vis and 100 m nir. Also
measured a few specific sites – light and dark pond at beginning, white ice and
melt pond at 100 m. Sky started PC-SDCV then gradually evolved into PC-SDBV.
Hajo was doing some dye experiments on the ridge-green kool-aid time. It will
be interesting to compare the water flow observations to the map that Jackie
and I made. Got the sea-birds set-up, maybe we’ll do some pond T/S studies
soon.
Found a
significant computer problem in the evening. All the icons were gone and only
the wallpaper was left. With much trial and error I got the icons back, but
Windows 95 seems a little flakey. It won’t exit. Rather than reload Win95 I
think I’ll take my chances for a while.
Mass balance
morning: Tom, Bonnie and Hajo did the full treatment on Tuk, Atlanta and the
Doghouse, while Jackie and I did the snow line, surface ablation, lead
measurements and surface ablation line. The crossing at Quebec Lead was tough.
We never would have made it with the generator. On Monday we’ll use the chopper
to forward position a sled and generator out there.
After lunch Tom,
Hajo, Jackie and I did some melt pond studies. Tom did KT-19 measurements until
the rain started. He was seeing +1 C. We did some ponds on the albedo line near
50 and 100 m, then some of the ones on the ridge that were surveyed.
Spent the evening
trying to get caught up on notes.
Early morning
helo mission to recover the 4 local stress sensor boxes. Not terribly
successful – we were only 1-4. We found Delaware and nothing else. Try going to
the May range and bearings, then switched to a search pattern, both to no avail.
Back to the drawing board.
It was an albedo
afternoon. Full 200 m Kipp, 100 m vis and nir plus site specific albedos at
some ponds. Afterwhich Jackie and I did the pond survey of the full 200 m. It
rained during the pond survey, not too hard, but a brief shower at 14:45.
Tonight at Irish coffee it was make and
wear your own tie. I used orange marking tape and carabiners. The next rotation
is coming up in 2 « weeks so its time to start clearing the slate of jobs. In
particular, I’d like to get as much helo work done as possible in the next
week. Its time to start scheduling things.
A bright
beautiful morning, so its time to do the helo survey. Tom, Jackie and I flew
this morning; full grid at 6000’. Melting has progressed since I flew a couple
of flights ago. We were looking for patches of the pond free ice nd had mixed
success. There were some places that looked as though ponds had just started to
form. I got the coordinates relative to the ship in case we have a chance to go
do some ground sampling. Bonnie and Hajo did the Seattle – Mainline full
ablation.
After lunch Tom
and Bonnie went to Atlanta, Tuk, and Doghouse for surface melting. Jackie and I
flew out to Baltimore. Revelation of the flight was that the dark rotting
portions in the water are places where the pond bottom has rotted to the point
where bouyancy breaks it off and it floats to the surface and rots. Did mass
balance, snow line and Kipp albedos from the original Stake 1 to Stake 2 (now
the second 100 m of the line). We them flew out to Seattle with an Akio,
generator, Variac and tinkertoys. We’ll leave this out here for mass balance
measurements – saves doing the Quebec crossing. We loaded the Quebec 1 box into
the helo and shipped it back. Jackie and I then did the Seattle lead
measurements plus the Seattle pond and the Ridge pond.
Good science
meeting tonight, we discussed the relative merits of continuous vs. discrete
processes for modeling the Surface Heat Budget. Cheez-its and rollos for the
evening snack.
So much for the
sunshine. It’s a foggy morning. Tom, Bonnie, Jackie and I decide to do an
optics subroutine and go out towards Quebec beyond the albedo line. Sky
conditions were CO-SDNV-foggy. We did 4 sets of ASD measurements while Tom and
Bonnie did some profiles. There were 2 ice sites and 2 pond sites. I drilled
one hole for the two ponds sites-it was the same pond just a bright area and a
dark area. The details are in the spreadsheet and in Jackie’s notebook. At the
melt pond sites we used the underwater detector for an extra set of albedos;
above the water, just below the water and at the ice/water interface. All in
all a very productive morning.
After lunch it
was the albedo routine-200 m of Kipps, 100 vis and nir plus light and dark pond
at beginning and a reference white ice and melt pond at the 100 m mark. There
is a site picture of Tom at the light/dark area. When we got done Jackie and I
went to the Ridge string for some ablation measurements. The first stake had
melted out so made a set of measurements with Jackie holding it in place, then
we reset the stake in a new position and repeated the first half of the pass.
The new stake is in line with the old one, but further away from the ridge.
The morning weather is too cloudy for the photo
mosaic, but not cloudy enough for helo albedo, so it’s a mass balance morning.
Tom and Hajo do the works out at Atlanta-Tuk-Doghouse, while Jackie, Bonnie and
I do the mainline snow survey, the Seattle lead, surface ablation and “stake
maintenance.” It was difficult to find rotting ice for stake maintenance. The
best source was the ridge by Seattle. Took a panorama of Seattle plus some
photos of the surface near the thermistor string. Good example of the bear fur
ice. Latest theory is that it’s last years pond ice. Had a great time doing the
lateral ablation measurements-it’s a fun job. Linguini with pesto for lunch –
excellent.
Scott went lead flying in the afternoon and was able
to sample at solar noon. For us it was blue ice and dirty ice optics near the
ridge. Jackie and Bonnie found the best local example of blue ice –
unfortunately it was thicker than our 2.5 m worth of auger, so we did albedos
and a downward looking profile in the hole. The hole had plenty of chips, but
no towel. At 14:38 it started to rain. This was a little early, since the rain
usually doesn’t come until 14:45. Had scattered light showers the rest of the
afternoon. Hit the dirty ice mother lode. Lots of sediment plus cryoconite
holes full of dirt. Also found some heavily candled ice. Did a bunch of albedos
of the candled ice plus the sediment laden ice. First made measurements at a
few specific sites (with photos), then did a mini-traverse sampling every 1.35
m. Note that I lowered the tripod to “zoom in” on the sediment. After this we
finished caretaking of the ridge and Pittsburgh stakes and called it a day.
In the afternoon word came out that another tethered
balloon escaped. Either the string broke or a know slipped. Evening
entertainment was the arrival of a bear that meandered out to Maui. Dean, Paul
and Matt went out, but the bear kept its distance and they never got close.
Meanwhile Robert (the helo pilot), Ingeregard, and Trevor were out walking 1 «
miles from camp looking for the instrument package for the balloon. Everyone
made it back safely.
Very foggy
morning, so no flying for now. For the morning subroutine Tom and Bonnie stayed
in to filter samples. Jackie, Hajo and I went to yesterday’s optics sites to
take some short cores. We sampled the blue ice, the dirty ice and a pretty blue
melt pond. The difference between the bluish ice and the white ice is that the
surface scattering layer of the blue is much thinner. Took photos of all cores
plus several of dirty ice. We also reset four of the thickness gauges on the
ridge line. They had been getting too tall.
It was albedos in
the afternoon; 200 Kipps, 100 m plus highlights vis and nir. Jackie and I then
did the melt pond profile along the line.
Pretty nice
morning (not beautiful), so let’s go flying. Jackie, Jamie and I went out to
find Sites 9 and 11. No problem finding 9, but no luck finding 11. Jamie had
some problems downloading the Sea-cat at 9 so he went back in the afternoon with
Matt to drill a hole. The ice had rafted and was thicker than the 4 auger
flights they had. Tom and Hajo did surface mass balance at Tuk and Atlanta in
the morning.
After lunch Tom
made some KT-19 measurements, while Bonnie, Jackie and I did the Seattle –
Mainline full ablation. We did 3 wall profiles at the Seattle ice edge. In one
place the shelf was 4.2 m long. Also did the surface ablation strings at
Seattle, Pond 81 and the new ridge.
It’s a beautiful
morning, above about 100 m. Down on the ground its quite foggy. Tom, Bonnie and
Hajo decided to stay in this morning to work on processing various ice samples.
Jackie and I went out and did 2 small subroutines. We remeasured the elevation
and depth of the “Alpine Lakes” by the ridge and then did an albedo line
perpendicular to the ridge. It was in a location roughly similar to where I did
some albedo transects in April.
After lunch the
fog dissipated and it was time to go flying. Denis and I had work on range and
bearings from the ship to Site 11 for the past week and got a best estimate of
9.8 nm and 060. Off we went and there it was, found it with no problems. It
took around 5 minutes to pack up the box and mark the spot with some garbage
bags on a nearby ridge and 10 minutes later we were back on the ship. We had
radioed ahead, so Tom and Bonnie were on the flight deck for the helo mosaic
flight. Though they flirted somewhat with a little fog on the SE portion of the
box, for the most part the weather was great. They flew a 5 nm x 5 nm box. The
details are in the spreadsheet. Combined with the mosaic Terry flew in late-May
this should give us a good before and after picture of the local SHEBA area. It
could make a great poster.
While the photo
mosaic was happening, Jackie and I were busy doing the albedo line under bright
sunny skies, with the occasional hint of clouds. Did the full 200 m on Kipps
and 100 m of SE590.
The weather isn’t
good for flying; the deck is too low for a photo mission and too broken for an albedo
flight. Therefore its time for Sunday morning catchup. The first order of
business is cleaning up my room, since rumor has it that there is an inspection
of today’s agenda. After that, rather than SHEBA data analysis, its trying to
write an AT-24 proposal. Not exactly my first choice for spending a morning at
SHEBA.
It was a mass
balance afternoon. Tom and Hajo did the full treatment at the doghouse, Atlanta
and Tuk, while Jackie, Bonnie and I did surface ablation, lead measurements and
“stake gardening” on the Seattle - Mainline run .
We need a second bucket for gardening. C-130 did an overflight and I got a
couple of photos. Hopefully there will be a good one. The prize is the cover of
BAMS. At 3:25 it started to rain and by the end of the day it was raining hard.
A foggy morning
with uniform incident so we did optics subroutines in the morning. Tom and
Bonnie did profile measurements in bare ice and ponded ice, while Jackie and I
did Kipps on Hajo’s local EM line. We did his 100 m line up and back, and then
did 100 m beyond the line for a total of 100 m. The idea behind up and back was
to generate statistics and get an idea of small scale variability.
After lunch it
was more optics with the 4 of us doing the albedo line. We did 200 m of Kipps,
200 m of vis, and 100 m of nir. I took digital photos for the vis measurements.
At the 45 m mark the sky condition went from O – SNDV to blue skies and the sun
blazing. A sharp cloud line moved through and I took a couple of pictures of
it. After optics Jackie and I did the pond survey on the full 200 m.
Evening science
meeting was interesting and fun. It was interdisciplinary night and there were
some nice presentations tying ocean-ice-atmosphere-biology together. A
highlight was a modeling skit put together by Bonnie, Ingegard, Sarah and
Karen. Next week’s meeting is the SHEBA column and SHEBA monopoly.
High, fairly
uniform cloud deck this morning, so we decided to go for a helo albedo flight.
When doing the pre-flight intercalibration I noticed that I was getting very
little light through the transmitted probe. My guess is that there is a break
in the fiber at the big metal connection. Details regarding the flight are in
the helo spreadsheet. It was a windy day which made the flight interesting. The
box kept moving around making it difficult to fly. Also on one leg we were
flying sideways because of the wind. We got to do some good maneuvers to get in
place for the start of the line. All and all a productive and fun morning.
After lunch it
was major mass balance at Seattle-Mainline; did surface, bottom and lateral
ablation. We also did some maintenance work redrilling holes for the snow line
and putting in stakes for the ground wires. Lead walking wasn’t quick so much
fun since it was blowing hard. As I was standing in the lead, the water
suddenly erupted in what appeared to be a burst of machine gun fire. It was
sleet! Little ice pellets that really stung when they hit you. Tony Beeseley
came along to lend a hand and see the sights. He was a casuality of the Quebec
Lead traverse. He tripped crossing a melt pond and did a face first into the
pond. Bonnie took him back to the ship while Jackie and I finished up the ridge
and Pittsburgh.
Work came in today
that the Polar Star problems are greater than anticipated and they are stopping
in Kodiak. We should expect a 2-day delay.
More wind, still
hard from the east. We decided to spent the morning inside getting caught up on
data archiving and AT-24 proposal writing. I didn’t accomplish much on my 24,
but I helped Jackie some.
After lunch it
was off to the albedo line. As we were gathering stuff in the tent for the
afternoon albedo measurements five blasts sounded. There was a mama and cub to
the east, headed straight towards Tuk. When they got there they broke off a
stake and started trashing the thermistor string. Since they were hanging
around and posed a potential threat we fired up the helo and escorted them away
from SHEBA. After that delay it was off to the albedo line. I decided to put in
some ice screws with carabiners at the 25 m marks to help hold the line in
place in the high winds. That worked pretty well.After that the albedos went
uneventfully – 200 Kipps, 200 vis and 100 nir.
Another windy
day. Too many low clouds for a photo flight so we decide to go to Baltimore in
the morning. It was mass balance at Quebec-Seattle in the afternoon. Decided to
change modes of transportation, instead of the fabled Quebec traverse we did an
easy rowboat ride. This proved to be inspired, because the ice began to diverge
while we were measuring at Seattle and the Mainline erasing the land route. The
crack between Quebec and the Mainline also began to open. What was a small step
is now a jump.
The wind
continues unabated from the west. Too many clouds for a photo flight so Jackie
and I decide to do some ASD measurements, while Tom and Bonnie do some
characterization along the albedo line. We did five sites: bluish ice, young
lead ice (frazil), white ice, unfrozen pond, frozen pond. Lots of frazil and
brash in the leads, along with some snow ice. Downwind portions of ponds have
1-2 cm of ice. Took site photos of all sites. Details are in Jackies logbook.
All in all a successful morning.
After lunch it
was the albedo line. We did 200 Kipp, 100 vis and 50 nir. Tom was having some
equipment problems so they didn’t get the full 100 done. After the optical
measurements Jackie and I did the pond depths along the albedo line. The ice
portion of the albedo line definitely looked whiter and brighter with a light
dusting of snow. It was a bit chillier – no surface ablation today. A day
without surface ablation is a good day.
Not as windy this
morning and its even sunny, though there is some haze on the horizon and a
beautiful fog bow. Decided to try to get a photo flight in. I arranged for us
to load things on the helo at 0915. We got everything loaded, but the fog was
in and out so we waited around. As we waited I worked on fixing the computer,
which had completely locked up. In would boot up in Windows and freeze-no icons
and no response to commands. After trying a variety of unsuccessful fixes I
went to Carol for help. He was able to fix things by removing some unused
network drivers.
After lunch
Bonnie, Jackie and I went off to Seattle and Quebec for mass balance. We passed
on Atlanta-Tuk, since there has been no surface ablation to measure. Seattle
and Quebec are a short row away, but now are on different pieces of ice. So we
rowed to Seattle first and made surface and bottom ablation measurements plus
edge profiles. We used a melt pond on the edge of the floe near the mainline as
our harbor. In fact, I took a couple of pictures of Bonnie and Jackie in the
boat measuring the stakes. After finishing the measurements we did some rowing
around, we could almost reach the Seattle lead by boat, but not quite.
I didn’t win, or
even come close at Bingo tonight, but it was a ton of fun. There was a major
turnout, around 40 people.
It’s a Sunday
morning catchup day. Rather than working on data, or the weekly science report.
I’m writing my AT-24 proposal. I got it done in the morning and sent off to Vicki
in the evening. Not my first pick as to how to spend my time at SHEBA.
In the afternoon
it was off to the albedo line. We did a full 300 m of Kipps, measuring the spur
line for the first time in a while. Remember there is a melted through crack at
95 m. Jackie got one foot in above her knee before she recovered. Also did 100
m vis and nir. Downloaded the week’s UV data. We were missing a couple of days
due to a glitch in either the computer of the instrument. We need to check more
closely to ensure that the program is running.
During the
evening bridge visit Rene showed me the drift track on the GPS display. It’s a
great example of inertial oscillations; general drift to ESE with scallops
every 12 hours or so.
What a difference
a day makes. There was major deformation starting at 2:00 am. There are major
openings to the north and the west. Sarah’s Lake is now Sarah’s Sea. Quebec and
Seattle are on separate islands. Once again, there is a big, multi-day blow,
the wind dies and everything falls apart. This morning Tom, Bonnie, Jackie and
I went out to the “Alpine Lakes” to do some melt pond albedos and ice structure
characterization. I used the ASD and did the standard albedo plus some albedos
using the transmitted sensor. Also measured some transmission through thin ice
on a refrozen pond. Details are in the spreadsheet.
In the afternoon
went to the rowboat to commute to Quebec and Seattle. I ferried Hajo, Bonnie
and the kayak over first. Jackie and I then got a ride with Scott from our dock
to Quebec. It was about 800 m to 1km away, so a motor was much nicer than the
rowboat. Everything looked fine on the floe, its just odd to see it as an
island. Swapped the storage module and went back to the dock. Jackie and I then
rowed over to Seattle to join Bonnie and Hajo. We were able to row right up to
the Seattle Lead site and take some pictures from the ocean perspective. Bonnie
and Hajo were doing EM lines. Jackie and I laser leveled 4 of Hajo’s lines. The
first 3 were every .5 m and the last every 1 m. After finishing the
measurements Hajo decided to have some fun and kayak back. The row back was
about 300 m, compared to 200 m on the way out. There is still divergence and
some relative motion between the pieces. Had to really hustle to make dinner.
Bonnie and Jackie went ahead, while Hajo and I got everything packed. They were
kind enough to get us plates of spaghetti. Nice combo – grilled cheese for
breakfast and spaghetti for dinner.
Divergence
continues. “Sarah’s Sea” even bigger than yesterday. Seattle and Quebec
continue to move, they are over around 11:00 now, instead of 12. Semi-promising skies this morning. Not
good enough for the long awaited helo photography flight, but OK perhaps for
helo albedos. Jamie has the chopper first to measure the amazing and growing
Sarah’s lead. We assembled at the helo deck at 1030 to load up, but the time
the chopper gets back (1050) and we get everything installed (1110) its raining
the ceiling is down to the deck. We decide to leave everything installed and
come back after lunch.
After lunch its
just as bad, so Jackie and I go out to do optics. Tom and Bonnie decide to
setup the microphotography stuff. Jackie and I are smoking on the albedo line.
After a latish start, we do 200 m Kipps, 100 vis and the pond depth survey and
get back in plenty of time for dinner.
The evening
bridge check shows Seattle and Quebec drifting by the Morison hut on Sarah’s
Lake. They are really moving.
Another morning
of fog. Bad flying weather for either pictures or albedos. The ceiling is less
than 100 feet (can’t see the top of the met tower). This morning Jackie, Tom
and I went to Tuk to retrieve the orange box and move it to the Ridge. The last
download from the Ridge seemed a bit flakey, so we’re going to try a new box.
Tom has a very nice road to Tuk. You definitely get the impression that it’s a
unique solution and there is no other way. Its tortuous with black holes and
crack all around. On the way back driving towards the camp gas station the sled
broke through some very thin ice. One second I was sitting on the sled
daydreaming, the next the sled was sinking and the water was rising. Jackie and
I both executed the same move simultanteously – shoulder roll off the sled onto
the firmer ice. Jackie got bonus points for grabbing the 2-inch auger once she
was done. We decided to walk the rest of the way to camp.
After lunch it
was time to do mass balance at Seattle and Quebec. Forget walking, forget
rowing, the only way to get there is by helo. Quebec and Seattle used to be
pretty much due north of the ship. In the past 2 days they’ve rotated
counterclockwise to around 8:00. Seattle is about a mile from the ship and
Quebec around « mile beyond. Got some good pictures of each site from the air
and from the ground. The standard Seattle panorama should look quite a bit
different this time. Most of the Seattle ponds are now connected to the ocean,
including the one where we do the surface profile. The shelf at the lead edge
has undergone considerable melting. Very rotten and it falls apart as you walk
on it. All in all, Seattle and the Mainline are holding together pretty well.
The Seattle floe is finally stuck in traffic and maybe will slow down a little.
Quebec is a little scarier to look at. The site is on the edge of the floe,
like a prow breaking the waves and the floe is out by itself. We may pull out
the pingers and the pressure sensor and swap the box. Did the standard full
mass balance at both sites. Conditions have remained cool with little surface
melting – great!
Got up bright and
early to call home and wish Carly a happy birthday – magic 13, another teenager
at home. Talked to Laura, Carly and Dan over a so-so connection. Kathy was at
work so I didn’t get to talk to her. Another foggy morning so no flying, not
even an helo albedo run. Instead Jackie and I assembled the gear needed to
extract the pingers and pressure sensor from Quebec2 and went out and measured
the pond 81 and ridge ablation strings.
After lunch
Jackie, Scott and I flew out to Quebec 2 to swap orange boxes and extract the
pingers and pressure sensor. It took a bit of effort to find the floe. We went
to Seattle, which is easy to find, and worked our way out from there. It’s a fun place to hang out, very
quite and a bit eerie being on the edge of an island off by itself in the
ocean. First bit of bad news was that sometime around July 20 the box shifted,
the battery moved and tore out the connector losing power to the CR-10. So we
have a gap of around 2 weeks in the data. Unfortunately that includes the
pressure sensor record of the floe breakoff. We did a little bit of drilling
and quite a bit of chiseling and recovered all the instruments without breaking
anything. We were back onboard at 1600 and went straight out to the albedo line
to help Tom and Bonnie finish up their measurements. Another day with no
surface ablation.
Another foggy,
windy morning, but at least its cool, with a morning temperature of –3C.
Outside it feels crisp and the snow is crunchy. This morning Jackie and I
decided to make a trip to Sarah’s Lake. Tom and Hajo went out to do mass
balance at Atlanta and Tuk, while Bonnie worked on board to set up her image
processing apparatus. Even though the ice has come together somewhat, Sarah’s
Lake is still huge. No shelf to speak of. According to Scott most of the
shelves melted off during the big blow a few days ago. We did a quick wall
profile and then got in the boat to cruise around the lead edge. But wait, the
fog is dissipating and there are clear skies above. We headed back to shore as
I quickly radioed the bridged to alert Bonnie to load up the camera equipment.
45 minutes later we were ready to fly. A great flight: 6000 feet, perfect
visibiliy and the only clouds just beyond our box. Lots of interesting scenery
all described in the helo log.
As we were
finishing a celebratory lunch, Bonnie came in with bad news. The Nikon jammed,
as it turned out very early in the flight. So we did it all again. The weather
was still pretty good, though the west leg had to be flown at 4500 feet,
instead of 6000. This time the Nikon worked fine, however it was one of the
mystery rolls of film. We’ll see how the developing goes. While the flying was
going on Jackie and I took advantage of the sunshine to do a BRDF site – bare
white ice. We just got done before the clouds came in. Since all the gear was
out we did transmission measurements of the white ice and a nearby pond. Site
photos on the Nikon between the helo flight and a 20 m tower panorama. Details
are in Jackies logbook.
Rehearsed for the
Improv Night after dinner.
Very foggy this
morning and a bit warmer. Summer may be back. In the morning we installed the
pressure sensor at Pittsburgh. The details of the installation are in Jackies
notebook. I backfilled the hole with chips and water from a nearby fresh
meltpond. Also downloaded data from the Ridge (which now has the Tuk box). It
looks good.
The weather
didn’t improve in the afternoon, so we bagged any thought of a helo albedo
flight. It was off to the albedo line. Yesterday’s firm white surface has
turned into a darker, slushier mess. However, yesterday’s sunshine appeared to
take its toll on the melt ponds.
Helo albedos in
the morning. Seattle and Quebec in the afternoon. Quebec logger is bad will
replace tomorrow.
Very foggy so
trip to Baltimore is on hold. Switched Pittsburgh over to Quebec 2 box. Hauled
Pittsburgh box in to take to Quebec 2. Not as crazy as it sounds. Did the ridge
with C-more – get video, good stuff. Did pond and ridge strings.
Did Baltimore, FY
ice is very rotten. Stopped at Quebec to change box. Went out to albedo line
Bonnie had done Kipps we did first 50 vis. Science meeting was bring a number
and there were some good ones – 73 straight days near 0 C. Polar Star due
tomorrow.
Morning radio
check indicates that Polar Star is almost in range and the rotation will be
starting around noon. Spent the morning packing and getting computer files in
order. Explained optics software to Tom and Bonnie. Terry arrived on the first
chopper around 1400. The 6 of us (Terry, Jackie, Hajo, Bonnie, Tom and me)
talked in the computer room for a while, then Jackie and I took Terry outside
for a walk around camp and a tour of our local sites. We stopped at the hut,
did the chores, checked Pittsburgh and the Ridge, and walked out to the albedo
line. Bruce arrived right at dinner time, so we all went to get some lasagna.
Jackie’s meal was interrupted by her 10 minute warning. Two flights later it
was my turn. In terms of closure, I left the way I came on 3 – 6 – 6. Contrast
between Des Gros and Polar Star is quickly apparent when we’re met by 20 color
coded members of the flight crew. I was led to my room in chief petty officer
country. Its small, but nice and I’m sharing it with the chief quartermaster.
First problem on the Polar Star is Kadko’s 12-man room. Personnel transfer
between the ships went like clockwork-very well done.
After yesterday’s
fire drill of getting everyone rotated we spent today slowly sailing 20 nm
north to Ice Station SHEBA to sling cargo. Spent a nervous hour wondering where
we were going to park, luckily it was a floe or two north of Sarah’s Lead. It
was strange to be looking south at the camp and to hear the dinner horn. After
a few hours of slinging we departed SHEBA and began the trip south.
Spent an hour
this morning being interviewed by Jonathan Ledgard of the Economist about
SHEBA. He is a political columnist for the magazine and is working on a big
article on Arctic politics. SHEBA might be a sidebar. In the afternoon I was briefly interviewed live on the
web about SHEBA. Only briefly because we lost our satellite connection.
I go to the
bridge at 0800 and 2000 for radio checks with the Des Gros. and provide written
updates for the SHEBA team. Otherwise, for the rest of the day I enjoy a life
of leisure on the Polar Star. Spent a few hours watching the ice go by, eat a
few meals (the food is good), read some magazines, work out in the gym, watch
the evening movie and play cards with Jackie, Hajo and Scott. Tonight I played
hearts for the first time in years. I was pretty rusty, but still won two games
in a rout. Won big the first game, at which point Jackie, Hajo and Scott united
to beat Don no matter what. I started game 2 by running it and they never
recovered.
Moving slowly
south through the ice. Lots of loosely packed thin rotting ice. Scott’s pick of
card games tonight – spades. The teams are Jackie and Scott against me and
Hajo. We’re robbed as they win by one point 502 to 501.
Continued south.
Pizza night tonight. Hajo and I win big in tonights rematch in spades. As the
day ends we’re steaming fast in open water. Have we seen the last of the ice?
No. After hours
in open water we’re back in the loose pack slowing us down. Will we make it for
the evening jet? The ice is primarily multi-year chunks. Some of it is quite
dirty. See a big bear on one floe who watches us with more curiousity than
concern.
We get to Barrow right after lunch and its decided
that we will use all forms of transportation to go ashore. We’re close enough
to swim, but will use the helos for SHEBA science team and the landing craft
for the Des Gros crew and the cargo. Time for one last SHEBA meeting to tell
everyone the plan and give the batting order. The whole operation goes smoothly
and I’m on the last chopper at 1600. After checking in at the airport a bunch
of us go off to dinner. Same restaurant as on the way in and the same meal –
grilled cheese and fries. All 20 of SHEBA science team are on the flight and
are holding our tootsie roll pops in the air as we taxi down the runway. When
the wheels are up there is a little cheer and we start eating. The rest of the
passengers think we’re insane. Changed planes in Anchorage and off to Seattle
on the red-eye.
Arrive in Seattle
at 0500 to overcast skies and a hint of rain. The first problem is finding a
car. This is difficult since its tourist season; no National, no Hertz, no
Avis, no Dollar, but an Alamo. The next problem is finding a hotel; no
University Inn, no Meany Tower, finally space at the Silver Cloud. It’s a nice
hotel, similar to the University Inn only a bit bigger with a refrigerator and
a microwave in the room. Free buffet breakfast.
Off to the UW for
lunch with Gary Maykut. Talked for a few hours about SHEBA. Ran into Mike
Steele and Axel Schweiger on the ave, so they joined us at the brewery-sandwich
shop.
Spent the morning
at PSC talking to Dick about SHEBA and the Tucson meeting. Afterwards it was
off to lunch with Gary Pyfer. I spent the remainder of the day goofing off –
REI, Gameworks, Kidd Valley. Gameworks has a new deal, all you can play in an
hour for $10.
Left Seattle at
the very bright and early hour of 0600. Flights to Boston were fine, the food
was even decent. Logan at evening rush hour was hectic as always, particularly
with all of our gear. Once we picked up the car it was an easy drive home. I
arrived at 2100, 82 days after I left. It was a long trip and its great to be
back.