Today we explored a very big floe, probably the biggest spatially in the whole region. Could this be our home for the next year? Extensive coverage of what look like frozen over melt ponds. Many measurements of 30-50 cm ice. This is not what we came to the central Arctic to find; it will not support our intended operations….. but the fear is that everything around will be a similar thickness to this large floe. For the time being, this is not our floe and we venture onward to explore another option that is relatively small spatially, but has strange central core that is highly reflective in satellite radar measurements. In those measurements, the outer part of the floe appears dark, with the inner part whiter…. The whole thing appears to be like an eye. But what is the pupil of this eye? So far no one has an answer.
