Quick Post

Hello all, sorry about not blogging for the past couple days.  We have been working hard. Yesterday we covered 105km by skidoo and completed six measurement sites.  Today we covered 80km and completed three measurement sites.  The days have been a bit long as a result of the distance, and on top of that I am sick. I probably should have stayed back today but I don't like doing that so I went out, and it was nice to have gone.  I got some great pictures which I will have time to shrink and post tomorrow I hope.

Again, sorry for the lack of posts and the lack of photos.  I promise to post more soon.

Cheers


Justin

Condition 2

Another exciting day in McMurdo Sound and Scott Base today. Last night we were informed we would be scheduled for a helicopter flight today, but that the weather would likely be poor. As predicted the weather did not improve overnight and so we did not do a helicopter flight. However, we had planned for this and departed Scott Base at 9 this morning to do more on ice measurements. The idea was that if conditions did improve we could always head back before our scheduled helicopter flight.

During the day it was quite pleasant, very warm but with some wind. As we continued our measurements the wind increased and the visibility then reduced as the fresh snow we have had over the past two days started to blow around. Let me assure you, it is very difficult to lay out a 30m long tape measure in a straight line when the wind blows. Unfortunately the pictures never seem able to capture the amount of wind.

Pictured above is also the sled that I ride on each day, it gets a bit tiring, but is also quite comfortable and fun. But can be tricky when the light is flat and there are lots of bumps, or when the wind picks up and starts blowing the snow and obscuring the surface, as happened today.

After our final measurement site that we completed today, on the way to another measurement site the wind increased and the snow started blowing around. Visibility was really reduced, was hard to see the skidoos just 100m or less behind me, but we are glad for GPS technology as you can basically navigate by it and don't really need landmarks.

This evening after supper the winds increased at Scott Base and visibility dropped dramatically. It was about -10 but with 25knot (45+km/hr) winds, so felt like -30. Here in Antarctica they use a three level system for weather and activities, Conditions 1,2,3. Condition 3 is the best weather, good visibility, temperatures above -55C and low winds. Condition 2 is when you have temperatures below -55 or higher wind, or reduced visibility, and Condition 1 is when it is really really bad ). You can see the weather for Scott Base at http://www.antarcticanz.govt.nz/weather/SBweather/sbweather.html. As a result of the worsening weather conditions here, they changed the weather condition from 3 to 2; this limits outdoor activity to on base and with permission, at least for those of us at the base.

Well that is all for today. Tomorrow will be another measurement day, unless of course the weather improves and we can fly, though conditions are again not predicted to improve.

Mush, Mush, Mush

Well despite the title we did not have sled dogs, but it felt a little like it as I was again on the sled behind the skidoo today. We covered another 50kms with our EM sensors and performed measurements at three sites. The measurements we conducted included snow depth, drill hole thickness, EM31 measurements, ground penetrating radar measurements and snow density. We are trying to gather accurate measurements to calibrate and validate the ability of the GPR to measure snow depth, and maybe ice thickness. We are also calibrating and validating the EM31 retrieval of ice thickness and hopefully platelet ice thickness.  We are also collecting valuable information on the properties of the snow and ice for the validation of the Cryosat-2 satellite, which aims to measure changes in the thickness of the sea ice using information on changes in the amount that the ice sticks up above the water surface (called freeboard).  This height is related to the density and thickness of the ice, but is affected by the snow density and depth (weighs down the ice) and by the low density platelet ice layer (what platelet ice is will be explained in a future post.
I only took one photo today, on the way back from our last sight. Just like the other day the weather closed in a bit and visibility dropped. It was not too bad, I quite enjoy it but it does really make you appreciate having a GPS to navigate.

Someone asked yesterday what the weather/temperatures are like. It is usually only -5C to -10C but it is often windy (today was between 10-20 knots at times, so quite windy, at times with the wind chill today it was below -20C. However, I gather that Edmonton has been much colder that past couple days.


Well that is it for today, we did not have a helicopter flight because of the weather. We are scheduled for a helicopter flight for tomorrow but the weather looks like it will be poor tomorrow as well. In any event we will go out on the ice in the morning and if the weather turns out to be good, head back early enough for a bird flight.

Well I should go, it is now midnight and in 6.5 hours I need to get up for another day!

GPS Deployment and Methodology Check

First I want to apologize for missing the blog posting yesterday, and for not being able to keep up with all the things I want to talk about, hopefully this will be rectified in the coming days. Things here have been quite busy and the Internet has been extremely limited in terms of speed so it has not been possible to post the photos I want, and I don’t have time to prepare the stuff I would like to.

Greg checking his GPS on a laptop inside the jacket tent.

Yesterday we deployed two GPS stations on the ice.  This involved three skidoos and sledges as we also towed the two EM31 ground based electromagnetic induction sensors.  We travelled 75km by skidoo, which means that I travelled 75km while standing on the back of the sled.  This was difficult at first but as we crossed West and farther south in the sound there was more new snow which softened the surface. On the way back we went to the ice shelf edge; the edge of the glacial land ice that is floating in this sound.  As you can see there is a lot of rocks, dirt and debris on this ice. Towards the end of the day visibility was dropping quickly and we were essentially travelling by GPS positions only.  Despite being able to easily see the lead skidoo from my position at the back, I know that from the front skidoo it would have been difficult to see anything at all and when I looked sideways or behind it really felt like you could only see a couple hundred meters at most.  Your sense of scale, distance and time completely disappears here without landmarks to reference yourself, and even with them I find it very hard here.

Ice Shelf Edge

After supper yesterday we had a meeting about our activity today and then Christian and I spent time putting the helicopter electromagnetic induction sea ice thickness sensor (“bird”, “HEM”) together.

Scott Base seen from the sea ice today.

Today, we had a full group meeting and went out to the ice to discuss measurement procedures and to familiarize ourselves with the under water camera systems we have to look at the platelet ice. This evening I had a rushed early dinner so that some of the other people could dine with the King of Malaysia who is here visiting the base until sometime tomorrow.  This evening we looked at some data, and did some more work with our HEM system to make sure all is working as we may have a helicopter flight tomorrow.  If we do not fly tomorrow we will be in the field doing measurements.

Well that is what I have been up to.  Last thing, as some of you know I have decided to participate in Movember.  In November, men across the world grow mustaches and collect money for prostate cancer research and for men’s health.  Prostate cancer causes many deaths and has a high treatability rate when caught early.  So far I have raised over 100 dollars but I am hoping some of my blog readers would want to donate some money to this cause. HOWEVER, I completely understand that this may not be a cause you support, or want to support, or that you support another cause, or only support causes you have fully researched, or that you do not know enough about the program (check out http://ca.movember.com). However, if you feel like donating, you can go to my MOVEMBER page (http://mobro.co/JustinBeckers and donate some money. If not, well no harm done in me asking I think, as it is for a good cause.

Sightseeing Anyone?

Well today we went to Cape Evans and the Scott Hut. This was a recreational trip. We journeyed to the site using a Hägglund. A Hägglund is a Swedish tracked vehicle that is also amphibious meaning that it can go through/over water. You see a lot of these vehicles in Antarctica, and I don’t know if you see them many other places. The tracks mean that per square inch of track they put less pressure on the snow than a skidoo, but they can carry about 10 people or 5 people and a lot of gear. The Hägglund has a front and rear compartment. Below is the Hägglund near an iceberg on our way to Cape Evans.

 

The Scott Hut we visited was built in 1910 and was used as the base for Scott’s expedition to the South Pole. This is a historically important hut and so has been preserved. There is old food and many artifacts inside the hut and outside. The hut still has the original asbestos and mercury. It always strikes me that either the men were smaller in this time or just made small beds for themselves out of necessity.

Nearby is the Barne’s Glacier which flows down off of Mount Erebus. Our guide drove us closer to the glacier so we could have a look. I feel this is your typical Antarctic glacier ending, in that it is a sharp drop.

On the way to this point and near where we camped yesterday is the Erebus ice tongue, which in the satellite imagery I have showed in previous points looks very impressive and dramatic, but when seen from the endpoint is much lower and unimpressive than I had expected.

Well that is all again today, sorry for the lack of science info, but it has been very busy again today, and the internet here has been excruciatingly slow, probably due to the weather we have been having. Tomorrow we head out on skidoos and sleds to cover 70+kms with the EM31s and set up two more GPS stations. Talk tomorrow.

Best Campsite EVER!

Hey All,

Well it is now 11:45pm and I have some time to write this blog. So yesterday we had a morning of Antarctic Field Training theory. This consisted of getting familiar with their standard operating procedures for things like safety, responsibility, sea ice travel, radios, etc. Then in the afternoon we were to meet at 3:30 to be ready to go to our field site.

Our excellent guides allowed us to combine some science with our practical training so we went out with three skidoos and a Hägglund (pictures of this and some of the other awesome equipment around will be in the posts). We towed our two EM31 ground based electromagnetic inductions sensors behind two of the skiddos. These are mounted on Nansen sleds and measure the total thickness, or snow plus ice thickness. These require a sled passenger to operate a foot brake that drags in the snow and slows the sled down. On the way out there, I was the sled passenger for one of the sleds. This was a lot of fun as you have some control of the sled by moving your body weight, but you need to hang on tight, especially once you get off the established trails. However we had some problems with one of the EM31 instruments as it kept losing the data connection between the data logger and the sensor.
Around Scott Base and McMurdo Stations there are a lot of trails that are marked and checked. These connect important places like the runway on the sea ice, research huts and so forth with the rest of the base. These trails get marked with flags that indicate where you can travel, where there are dangers such as cracks, holes, or thin ice or where there are pipelines/wires. The colors of these flags are red/green, black, and blue, respectively. The red/green flags that mark routes indicate that 5m to each side of the flag is known to be safe.
Upon arrival at our field site near the end of the Erebus Ice Tongue, we set up camp including some nice mountaineering Mountain Hardware Tents, and some Scott tents (Scott Polar Tents). These tents are really excellent, but are very heavy (30kg or so). Here you can see my tent (shared with Christian) and in the background is Mount Erebus, a mountain/volcano on Ross Island. Definitely one of the best camp spots I’ve ever had.

After cooking a delicious supper consisting of dehydrated campers food, I had the Beef Pasta Hot pot which was very good, Dan, Ken and I took a little walk to the ice tongue just to see it up closer. We were asked by the supervisors and field trainers not to go up onto the ice tongue because of crevasse (ice cracks) danger. Here you can see our camp out on the sea ice.

This morning, we took down camp, and then put up a GPS station near the camp, this involved some basic shoveling of snow, drilling a hole through the ice (to get the water level), and setting up a couple of tripods, one for the GPS unit and one for the solar panels to charge the battery.

Then we headed back to the base, after our amazingly beautiful weather on the first day we had some wind in the morning that really picked up during our trip, making the ride back much less pleasant, with reduced visibility and blowing snow. However we traveled in a close convoy and visibility was not terrible. However I still enjoyed it, nice to see what the wind is like here.

One interesting thing about Antarctica is that because of all the cold ice here, the air moving over it cools. Since cold air is denser than warm air it begins to move downhill as a result of gravity, and as it does so you get a wind called katabatic winds.

Once we got back to Scott Base we had to DEMOB (demobilize) our Antarctic Field Course material. Here at Scott Base the scientists are far more responsible for cleaning up after themselves and helping with base operations (such as helping in the kitchen, with dishes, etc). We had to unpack all of our gear, wash the tents, hang sleeping bags, do some laundry, and so forth. After that we had some more discussion of our training, mostly on things to improve, things to watch out for and other suggestions. We then finished with a practical scenario, in which one member of our party was injured, and another was wet and the other members in the team had to identify the critical issues, delegate and deal with them. This was really good as it forces you to think quickly and carefully. By the time this was all done it was supper time.

After dinner, Dan and I walked along the ice ridge recreational route near the base. Weddell seals area everywhere in this area as they come up through cracks/thin ice and maintain their holes. They come up onto the ice to sun. It must also be calving season as there are several baby seals on the ice. Here in Antarctica you are supposed to maintain a 10m distance from wildlife while on foot, but you should not put yourself in a dangerous position to do so. In this case, the route is flagged and so you cannot stray to far from the flags. We tried to maximize our distance from the animals but this still gets you quite close in some cases.

By Scott Base, there are some very large pressure ridges where the sea ice has collided with the land has has been forced up onto it, forming immense ridges of ice.

I had hoped to have some more scientific information ready to present to you, or an interview with one of our group members, but I haven’t had time. We have been quite busy so far, and this will hopefully get better over the next few days, so maybe tomorrow.

Tomorrow, Dan, Ken, Christian and I are going on a tourist trip organized by the base to Cape Evans and the Terra Nova hut (I actually don’t know the history here but will try to find out for you guys). This will take all day, but I’ve been told to go so no arguments. I also hope to have some pictures of some of the vehicles here, but maybe not as I will have the trip to talk about. But we will see, am really hoping there will be penguins at the site as I have heard that there may be.

Well until next time, hope you are all doing well, especially my lovely wife.

Skidoo Training

After an excellent nights sleep last night and a quick shower (navy style, get wet, turn water off, soap up, turn water on and rinse off: targeted water use is less than 3 minutes), I have had a good day.

After breakfast this morning we had our event “In Brief”. Every science campaign is called an event, and the briefing this morning was between our team and the base coordinators to make sure both groups know what the other wants, expects, etc.

After that we started preparing equipment such as the EM31, our ground based electromagnetic induction sensor.  We have two here, one of ours ( a short version) and the standard version from Wolfgang.  There were also two ground penetrating radar units to set up (Wolfgang’s and Pat Langhorne’s) and numerous GPS stations.

We also started to work on our airborne electromagnetic sensor (HEM bird or Rosie) but discovered that whoever tightened the bolts last really put them far too tight and several needed to be drilled out to get them out.

In the afternoon, we had skidoo training, getting people familiarized with how they work, some simple maintenance tasks and a little driving session.  It was nice to get back on a skidoo.

Our Antarctic Field Training course begins tomorrow and will involving skidoo and  camping out on the ice and learning about some of the safety aspects of our work and some survival training. We will use the field training activity to visit one of the sites where we wish to deploy a GPS station to monitor the tides during the duration of our visit.  We will also tow the two EM31 sensors ground sensors along with us, and maybe more equipment as well.  It will be good for people to get used to pulling the sleds holding our equipment and a good way to familiarize/refresh people with the equipment.

This evening we quickly tested the EM31s on the sleds, and we are ready for tomorrow.  Unfortunately I haven’t had time to write any science or get anyone to write about what they do.  There are 9 people in our team, and I hope to get all of them to write a short blurb about what they study, why they are here and what their favorite thing about Antarctica is, so stay tuned.

Arrived in Scott Base

Well today I have arrived in Scott Base, ANTARCTICA!! We had a good flight, security in the morning and then a smooth 5 hour flight in the C17.  This was really cool, we sat on the side with cargo in the middle which included to large Ford utility vans sitting side by side with enough room to walk around and between them.



After arrival we had a tour and safety briefing followed by dinner and then a team meeting. It is now 10:15pm here and so time for bed, especially after only sleeping 5hrs last night. I hope to have more time to write tomorrow, but have prewritten a little segment on Antarctica for you. Also hope to have some more pictures of Scott Base and area soon, plus pictures and video from Antarctic Field Training and other things.  The internet connection here is not fast though so pictures will be lower resolution and movies may not be possible until I return.

Today I also want to present a little bit of general information about Antarctica, but I find myself having great trouble deciding what to present to you. I think I will start with some general properties of Antarctica, then the Antarctic Treaty. There is much more to talk about but I will spread it out so as to not overwhelm you all. Please note that my information comes from the CIA World Factbook available online (reference at end of the blog).



Antarctica covers some 14 million square kilometers, the average elevation are between 2,000 and 4,000m with the tallest mountain the Vinson Massif towering at almost 4900m. Some regions are ice free, and of these places is the McMurdo Dry Valleys. In contrast to the Arctic which is essentially an ocean that is mostly surrounded by land, the Antarctic is a continent surrounded by an ocean. The atmosphere also has a large ring around Antarctica and some of you may remember the Ozone Hole over Antarctica. Antarctica is often described as two large regions, the East and West Antarctic Ice Sheets. This is because the West Antarctic Ice Sheet has large regions underneath it that are below sea level, it has the Antarctic Peninsula which extends to the north and generally contains thinner ice. However this region is also where a lot of the dramatic changes you may hear about are occurring (on glaciers such as the Pine Island Glacier or the Larsen Ice Shelf). The East Antarctic Ice Sheet is thicker, generally colder and has been thought to be less responsive to change (a paradigm which has changed). Besides the ice sheets there are also the glaciers, the ice shelves (freshwater ice that is floating in the ocean), ice streams (rapidly moving glaciers), and of course sea ice. Scientists have discovered large lakes under nearly four kilometers of ice, the most famous being Lake Vostok, and have observed many more lakes in the past decade.

In terms of wild life, well first thing are NO POLAR BEARS, but you get whales, orcas, seals, many bird species, many fish and other marine species, and of course the always well dressed penguins. There is simply to much to discuss, it is like describing what Canada or North America is like, where do you begin, what do you leave out, so I will move on.

Antarctica is governed by a treaty, and while seven countries lay claim to parts of the continent (UK,France,Norway,NZ, Australia, Chile, Argentina) they have all agreed to withhold the claims process/decisions for a very long time. The USA has been VERY active in Antarctica since near the beginning and while not an original claimant maintains the right to claim (along with Russia). In 1961 the Antarctic Treaty came into force, and outlined rules for the governance of Antarctica, including no military activity (except to support science), freedom for scientific collaboration and research(very important during this Cold War period), froze the claims, prohibits use of nuclear power/energy including weapons, waste, etc. All in all it is a pretty incredible thing to see so many nations (7 claims members, 28 consultative status members and 20 non-consultative status members) working together, and much of it came out as a result of the International Geophysical Year (s) in the 1950s. Since the Treaty, other acts have come up to protect the land and marine environment as a result of the increased activity in the Antarctic.

Well there is today’s attempt to include some valuable information to you. Again if you have questions please do not hesitate to ask. Also if I have made any mistakes, I apologize to all my readers, just please let me know so I can rectify the information.

Quick Note

Well it is 5:30 am, on Wednesday November 16, 2011.  It is raining here in Christchurch, New Zealand.

I'm pretty much packed up and ready to go so hopefully the next post says I have arrived.

That is all the news, and hopefully you like the new default blog format.  IF not, you can change it using the little bar just above the blog (where you have options of CLASSIC, FLIPCARD, etc.)

Getting Kitted and Sight-seeing in Middle Earth

For those Lord of the Rings fans out there you will know that New Zealand is Middle Earth.
Some geekiness aside, today was a great day.

After the fantastic evening last night I was pretty tired but this morning at 8:30 sharp we were at Antarctica New Zealand getting kitted out, that is getting our personal clothing. Unlike the system in Canada, Antarctica New Zealand provides cold weather gear to all personnel going to the Antarctic.
I won't be showing any pictures of the gear yet, but I promise to show some as we work.
The gear they provide is really excellent and includes long johns, socks, balaclavas, hats, gloves, mitts, goggles, sunglasses, midweight fleece layer, a synthetic insulated jacket, windproof softsheel, and a big down parka, and ski pants and two pairs of boots.  Tomorrow we have to wear certain things on the plane such as the big down parka, the ski pants and boots, googles, gloves and a hat.
The gear is really nice, high quality and has some bright orange.

Tomorrow we fly out on a C-17 Globemaster III .  We get picked up at 6am, go through security, watch a safety video, then more security and then we depart at 9am.  It will be about a 5hr flight. I will post some pictures as soon as I can.

After the gear outfitting we went back to Wolfgang's house for a few hours while he went back to the University to finish up some last minute things. Then in the late afternoon we went for a short walk to Taylor's Mistake, named after a man who sailed into the wrong harbour.

Well the timestamp in all my pictures is wrong, but will be fixed in the future.  It was actually the 15th of November between 3pm and 6 pm.

New Zealand is an absolutely beautiful country, so many hills and valleys, mountains, streams, twisting curvy roads and because it is spring, very very green, quite nice after leaving Edmonton with snow, ice and leafless trees.


Well I need to shower and sleep.  Keep tuned for more pictures and updates.

Updated:Getting Settled

Today is my second day in Christchurch.  I had a fantastic night's sleep and am ready for today's events. At the very least I know I will be getting "kitted out" today, that is, getting assigned my polar gear from Antarctica New Zealand.

After arriving at our host's house yesterday afternoon, I took the time to get caught up on emails and so forth and to download some satellite imagery, mainly radar imagery. Then last night some colleagues of our host (Dr. Wolfgang Rack) invited us over for a BBQ.  This was really really nice, I had some fantastic New Zealand wines, excellent steak.

As some of you may remember, Christchurch was hit by several earthquakes since September 2010, with earthquakes also happening in  February 2011 and again in June 2011. Driving through Christchurch you can easily see the damage, empty lots, some rubble and in some places the road is warped.  The people who invited us for the BBQ yesterday lived in an area that occurred a lot of damage.  Luckily their house is on bedrock and seems to show less structural damage, though they did lose basically everything inside the house, not just once.  In places the road is bent and warped, houses have been lifted up and slammed back to the earth or have moved down hillsides. Many homes and businesses have been condemned and there are still a lot of issues with safety.  Some places only recently have had sewage connections restored and you can still find lots of portable toilets all over the place. Wolfgang's house lost its chimney and several bookcases,cabinets and their contents were knocked down or broken.

Pretty incredible stuff, I cannot even imagine the forces at work, the amount of energy and how frightening it would be to experience an earthquake.  I think it would also be quite demoralizing to have so many earthquakes.


As I have mentioned a few times, I want to bring in a bit more of the basic science we do and information on the tools of our research into my blog. So today I thought I would discuss radar images.  We use satellite images for many purposes:  planning, monitoring and actually get data from them as well.

Satellite radar image from the ASAR sensor aboard the Envisat satellite.  Image Courtesy of Polar View (http://www.polarview.aq)

Just like a camera, a radar image gives us a picture of an area. An optical sensor essentially takes a picture and is measuring the amount of sunlight being reflected from objects in your picture. Optical refers to the visible light spectrum, what you and I can see with our eyes. I've used some optical images in earlier blog posts regarding this trip.
In contrast to an optical image, A radar image sensor actually sends out its own energy (think sunlight) and measures how much of it is returned from each point in the image.  Radar sensors use energy from a different part of the electromagnetic spectrum so not blue, green, or red like a camera but actually use microwave wavelengths (1-100 Giga Hertz(GHz). The image above is from Envisat, a European Satellite mission that carries a microwave imaging sensor called ASAR (Advanced SAR).  The sensor sends C-band 5.3GHz microwaves to Earth's surface and measures the energy that is returned to it.

Satellite radar imagery is extremely important to our work for several reasons:
1) We like to plan where we are going and what the conditions on the surface are.
2) Unlike a camera picture, radar images actually see through clouds(*for the most part at most frequencies below 10GHz). This is really handy since the polar regions often have cloud cover.
3) Rapid availability with good resolution and good areal coverage.  Some of the images we get are available to us just a few hours after they have been collected.  The delay is due to the time it takes to get an image downloaded from the satellite to the ground and then for the ground station to process the image.
4) Can actually get useful information from the images such as relative ice thickness, ice age, find areas of rough ice and actually record the values recorded from each pixel to try to relate to other parameters.

You can get free radar images from sites like Polar View (see SAR photo caption for link). Images from optical sensors like MODIS and Landsat are also available for free (i.e. the NASA MODIS Rapid Response System or GLOVIS.

Well that wraps up this blog post.  Another one should come up later this evening after the "kitting out" and with some more details on my trip south tomorrow. As usual if you have any comments or questions just post below and I'll try to answer.

Arrived in Christchurch!

Hello All,

Just a quick note today.  I am safely arrived in Christchurch, New Zealand and am at our host's wonderful house.  Below are some of my first glimpses of New Zealand from the plane.  This is a big trip for me in that it is the first time I am south of the equator, the first time to New Zealand and the first time flying over the Pacific Ocean.

Leaving Edmonton we had just had the first snowfall of the year after a long autumn.  But here in New Zealand, spring is here with summer just around the corner.

My first Glimpse of New Zealand.  Note that the time stamp is still Edmonton time.

I am not too tired, I did not work much on the plane but managed to get 7 hours of sleep, which was really really nice. Feeling quite refreshed and should be able to stay awake until tonight.  It is of course 1pm local time on Monday, Nov. 14th, 2011 but only 5pm Edmonton time on Nov 13, 2011.

Will post soon.

Justin