Kapitan Dranitsyn arrived yesterday, to great fanfare from people on both ships….. but apparently our ice floe was not as happy to have another ship around. Cracks emanating from the area of the ships headed out in multiple directions. Right through Met City, right through Remote Sensing city. One went between the Met Hut and… Read More

It is perhaps my last tower climb while being here on Leg 1. Some days ago I had climbed our tower in modest winds to pull down a met sensor that needed to be swapped out (it was needed for elsewhere). And in the process, we wanted to compare met sensors from different heights. So… Read More

Wow what a blitz it has been around here lately. Seems that time is accelerating as the Dranitsyn cruises towards us with the Leg 2 group of scientists and crew. They are ready, I’m sure. But it seems that we arenot yet ready to hand everything off to them. So many last minute details to… Read More

Every day is packed full of hard work and many activities, but sometimes there are very busy days. Like today. Here is a day in the life out here. Wake as late as possible, about 7:45, peel myself out of bed, sleep still in my eyes, pull some clothes on and a hat to cover… Read More

Once again the ice dynamics have become active. High winds from the south have been pushing against our floe, and across the major shear zone that extended across the front of the ship. We’ve seen a little bit of activity there in the last days, but not much. But now things have really come together,… Read More

We took a journey on the ice today, following a northern German tradition. It’s not really clear to me what the point of a kohltour is, although I experienced one once before when I lived in Germany for a year as a 19 year old. Back then it was pulling wagons along the dike of… Read More

We went back to the L2 site in our distributed network. Helicopter ride as usual. Touchdown and then it is a flurry of activity offloading all the equipment out of the back with the rotors still going. Turbulent winds, snow blowing all around. Lifting out heavy boxes, safety gear, our toolkit. Once the helicopter lifts… Read More

It’s been so cold out lately, and windy. Makes it hard to work. I feel the need to cover my face full time now, and with that, it is a huge challenge to wear glasses; they just fog up right away and then are completely useless. So I often go without glasses, which works for… Read More

With all the ice movements and openings, travel across the ice becomes a big challenge. We have to hop from floe to floe to get to Met City, sometimes over ridges and sometimes across cracks. Today was especially challenging because there was fresh snow that had blown across everything, covering cracks and thin ice. Blowing… Read More

There are some interesting sounds out here. The wind howling, you can even hear the snow blowing along the surface with little tinkles. The pops of a new crack forming. Water lapping up against the side of an open lead. But today were some great sounds. The squeak of a ridge being formed. Sheets pressing… Read More