Category Archives: Polar Exploration

Thule on My Mind: Deep Water Port and Air Force Base

Posted on June 6, 2013 by | 2 Comments

I am an air force brat. My father and my father-in-law enlisted in the German and US Air Forces, respectively. They served during the Cold War when I was born in 1961 a few month after the Berlin Wall went up. My father-in-law was stationed in Thule, Greenland, a northern forward base with radars to detect ballistic missiles, fighter jets to intercept planes, and bombers to retaliate in nuclear war. About 60 years later, the fighter jets, bombers, and communist threat are all gone, but the base is still there, and to me it is the gateway to North Greenland. Both US and Canadian Coast Guard icebreakers call its port to receive or discharge crews and scientists such as myself in 2003, 2006, 2007, 2009, and 2012.

An F-102 jet of the 332d Fighter-Interceptor Squadron at Thule AFB in 1960. [Credit: United States Air Force]

An F-102 jet of the 332d Fighter-Interceptor Squadron at Thule AFB in 1960. [Credit: United States Air Force.]

Today about 58,000 people live on Greenland spread over an area three times the size of Texas. On July 9, 1951 about 12,000 men arrived by ships to build the base. The 1953 film “Operation Blue Jay” documents the context, people, scenery, logistics, and construction that made today’s Thule Air Force Base (AFB).

The place should really be called by its native name Pituffik, but in 1953 about 130 Greenlanders living nearby were forcibly moved about 100 km to the north to what is now the town Qaanaaq, population 600. Lots of stories here, but I want to focus on the port of Thule:

Thule AFB with its airport, pier, and ice-covered ocean in the summer. The island is Saunders Island. The ship is most likely the CCGS Henry Larsen in 2007. [Credit: Unknown]

Thule AFB with its airport, pier, and ice-covered ocean in the summer. The island is Saunders Island. The ship is most likely the CCGS Henry Larsen in 2007. [Credit: Unknown]

CCGS Henry Larsen in North Star Bay on Aug.-2, 2012 at the pier at Thule. Dundas Mountain is visible as is the Greenland Ice Sheet in the background to the south-east. [Credit: Andreas Muenchow]

CCGS Henry Larsen in North Star Bay on Aug.-2, 2012 at the pier at Thule. Dundas Mountain is visible as is the Greenland Ice Sheet in the background to the south-east. [Credit: Andreas Muenchow]

Dr. Helen Johnson in August 2009 on the pier of Thule AFB with CCGS Henry Larsen and Dundas Mountain in the background. [Credit: Andreas Muenchow]

Dr. Helen Johnson in August 2009 on the pier of Thule AFB with CCGS Henry Larsen and Dundas Mountain in the background. [Credit: Andreas Muenchow]

Pier at Thule in Aug.-2012 with the Air Force Base and the Greenland Ice Sheet in the background. [Credit: Andreas Muenchow]

Pier at Thule in Aug.-2012 with the Air Force Base and the Greenland Ice Sheet in the background. [Credit: Andreas Muenchow]

The Port of Thule is the northernmost deep-water port in the world. It was meant as temporary structure in 1951 when it was built within less than 3 weeks around 4 barges each 76 meters long and 15 meters wide. These barges contained self-raising jacks to lift themselves up out of the water. Each barge was then supported with 12 concrete filled cylinders with steel-jackets to protect them from moving ice. In 2006 the so-called DeLong pier was repaired as some of the underwater support columns had developed cracks as the steel used in 1951 did not conform to modern engineering standards.

Thule Pier showing support cylinders during its 2006 repair [Credit: Appledorn Marine Engineering Inc., Portsmouth, NH]

Thule Pier showing support cylinders during its 2006 repair [Credit: Appledorn Marine Engineering Inc., Portsmouth, NH]

I learnt all of this last week writing yet another proposal. A group of electrical and system engineers, computer scientists and oceanographers submitted a high-risk proposal to the National Science Foundation. Together we plan to build the prototype of an underwater communication network. I think of it as a cell-phone tower system under water. The goal is to get ocean data transmitted under water over long distances for a long time. This has never been done in the Arctic, but we would like to connect such a network to pier of Thule AFB so that our ocean data can be relayed back via satellites and internet connections. That’s the idea and that’s why Thule is on my mind …

Arctic sea ice near Thule, Greenland during transition from land-fast (Mar.-4, 2013) to mobile (May-22, 2013) ice along with tentative sensor array (red) and 2003 track of bottom survey (blue). Contours are 50, 100, 150, and 200-m bottom depth. Dark areas are open water, white areas are snow or ice, land topography is naturally illuminated by a low sun-angle on Mar.-4. [Data from MODIS Terra.]

Arctic sea ice near Thule, Greenland during transition from land-fast (Mar.-4, 2013) to mobile (May-22, 2013) ice along with tentative sensor array (red) and 2003 track of bottom survey (blue). Contours are 50, 100, 150, and 200-m bottom depth. Dark areas are open water, white areas are snow or ice, land topography is naturally illuminated by a low sun-angle on Mar.-4. [Data from MODIS Terra.]

Elwood, N.J. and J.W. Gaithwaite (2007). Perpetuating a Pier, Civil Engineering, 77 (5), 62-67.

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Posted in Greenland, Polar Exploration, Uncategorized

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Greenland, Frederica de Laguna, and Early Convergences

Posted on March 31, 2013 by | 1 Comment

Not sure why, but this 1929 photo of two young scientists working off Greenland has been in my mind for the last 3 days. It shows a 23-year old graduate student of Anthropology from Columbia University, Frederica de Laguna, with one of her mentors, Archaeologist Dr. Therkel Mathiassen from Denmark. They were digging near Upernavik, Greenland for evidence of long-lost people living in north-west Greenland. It changed the life of Frederica de Laguna, the graduate student, as this summer in Greenland revealed the deep passion that she lived for 75 years after this photo was taken: Arctic Anthropology, the study of people, places, cultures. To me the photo shows an exuberant, yet relaxed and deep happiness after tiresome, yet immensely fulfilling work.

Frederica de Laguna with Therkel Mathiassen in 1929 near Upernavik, Greenland. [From Bryn Mawr College's Collections

Frederica de Laguna with Therkel Mathiassen in 1929 near Upernavik, Greenland. [From Bryn Mawr College's Collections]


My strange obsession with Frederica de Laguna relates to convergent story lines that I am still trying to untangle. Her advisor at Columbia was Franz Boas who as a German physicist lived on southern Baffin Island during the First International Polar Year 1883/84 to study “everything” that he saw and experienced around Cumberland Sound which was a northern base for the whaling industry. His description of a massive iceberg is so detailed, that I feel comfortable to conclude, that he describes an ice island from Petermann Glacier about 1600 miles to the north. After his Arctic field work he emigrated to New York to become one of the founders of American Anthropology in the 20th century. Frederica de Laguna was one of his last graduate students, receiving her PhD in 1933 while digging in Alaska.
Inuit women and children visiting the Hans Egede in Greenland in 1930. [From Cambridge University]

Inuit women and children visiting the Hans Egede in Greenland in 1930. [From Cambridge University]


It took Frederica and her companion 18 days to sail from Copenhagen, Denmark to Upernavik, Greenland aboard the Hans Egede. Two of her sailing companions, a Dr. Krueger from Germany and his assistant Age Rose Bjare of Denmark were planing to explore the geology of Ellesmere Island and areas to the west of it in northern Canada and disappeared. In her autobiography she writes succinctly: “I don’t like Dr. Krueger. He thinks too much of himself.” This sentiment is also reflected by the Canadian police officer who described him as a “punk outfit and a badly overloaded sledge.” Her return sail she shared with Dr. Alfred Wegener, a German geophysicist and his group returning from initial explorations of Disko Bay, Greenland testing the first snowmobiles for a larger expedition to take place the following year in 1930. They probably provided one of the first descriptions of Jacobshavn Isbrae, a fast-moving Greenland outlet glacier. In 1929 it still had a substantial ice-shelf that disintegrated the last 15 years and is lost to history.
The evolution of Jacobshavn Isbrae retreat from 1851 through present. [From NASA's Earth Observatory]

The evolution of Jacobshavn Isbrae retreat from 1851 through present. [From NASA's Earth Observatory]


Alfred Wegener lost his life the following year when he tried to rescue companions who maintained a weather station on Greenland’s ice-sheet. His largest scientific contribution was the idea, that continents move, that North-America, Greenland, and Europe once connected, perhaps, and had drifted apart over the millenia. Since he did not have a physical mechanism detailed, it took oceanographers another 50 years to sort that part out, Wegner’s idea of continents adrift was ridiculed by the establishment at the time and eventually forgotten. It took another 30-40 years for it to revolutionize geology as a dynamic discipline. Plate tectonics is the standard now that explains earthquakes, vulcanoes, and much more. It perhaps did not help Dr. Wegner with the geologists like Dr. Krueger, that he was trained in physics, as was Dr. Boas, the advisor of the now renowned Arctic anthropologist Francisca de Laguna of Bryn Mawr College in Pennsylvania.

The observant reader will notice how many Germans are in this set of story lines. Franz Boas was Jewish and thrived,in the Americas, Hans Krueger was a pompous idiot who disappeared, and Alfred Wegener was a tragic hero. All were German scientists, all converged with Frederica de Laguna in 1929 just when she emerged as a powerful mind of her own as a young graduate student in a field dominated by men. When Germany invaded Poland and France 10 years later, Dr. Frederica de Laguna was teaching her passions at Bryn Mawr College outside Philadelphia. When the war came to America, she asked for a leave of absence to serve in Naval Intelligence where she became a Lieutenant Commander. Her superiors at Bryn Mawr considered this a waste of her time, but she disagreed, and so do I. It is the many personal choices we make, both small and large, that form our personal histories, our science, our selves, and the larger history that we all live … [to be continued]

Davis, R. (2006). Frederica de Laguna of Bryn Mawr College Arctic Anthropology, 43 (2), 21-27 DOI: 10.1353/arc.2011.0075

VanStone, J., & de Laguna, F. (1980). Voyage to Greenland: A Personal Initiation into Anthropology Ethnohistory, 27 (2) DOI: 10.2307/481234

Fredericade Laguna in 1993 at age 87; she worked until age 98 [From New York Times, photo by Bill Roth, Anchorage Daily News]

Frederica de Laguna in 1993 at age 87; she worked until age 98. [From New York Times, photo by Bill Roth, Anchorage Daily News]

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Posted in Polar Exploration

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Oceanography and Icebergs in Baffin Bay: LCDR Edward “Iceberg” Smith

Posted on March 27, 2013 by | 2 Comments

In 1928 Edward H. “Iceberg” Smith took the 125 feet long Coast Guard Cutter “Marion” on an 8,100 mile journey from Boston, MA to New York City, NY via Disko Bay, Greenland. Along the way he defined operational Arctic Oceanography to explain and predict iceberg entering the busy sea lanes off North-America. The Titanic was sunk in 1912, the International Ice Patrol was formed in 1914, and LCDR Smith sailed to Greenland in 1928. The data are priceless 85 years later still. I used them to place modern observations from 2003 into a context of climate variations. First, however, let me give credit to one of the pioneers on whose scientific shoulders I stand:

Edward H. "Iceberg" Smith of the US Coast Guard with reversing thermometer.

Edward H. “Iceberg” Smith of the US Coast Guard with reversing thermometer.

“Iceberg” Smith entered the Coast Guard Academy at age 21 in 1910 and served during World War I as a navigator on Atlantic convoy escort duty. After this war his ship was detailed to the International Ice Patrol and he became one of its first scientific observers at age 32 in 1921. As such he was sent for a year to Bergen, Norway in 1925 to learn the latest theories in physical oceanography. Scandinavian explorers like Nansen, Ekman, Sverdrup, Bjerknes, and Helland-Hansen defined physical oceanography at this time by applying physics on a rotating earth to phenomena that they observed from ships sailing at sea or ships frozen in Arctic ice. Much of this revolutionary work is now elementary oceanography taught in introductory courses, but then, nobody knew much about why ice and ocean move they way they do. It was time to put ideas to a thorough test which is what “Iceberg” Smith did, when he got his ship and orders to explore in 1928.

USCGC Marion built in 1927 [from http://laesser.org/125-wsc/]

USCGC Marion built in 1927. Note the scale indicated by a person standing on the lower deck. [From http://laesser.org/125-wsc]

Armed with new ideas, knowledge, and the tiny USCGC Marion “Iceberg” Smith set to out to map seas between Labrador, Baffin Island, and Greenland to explain and predict the number of icebergs to enter the North-Atlantic Ocean. During his 10 weeks at sea he mapped ocean currents from over 2000 discrete measurements of temperature and salinity at many depths. This was before computers, GPS, and electronics. In 1928 this was slow to work with cold water collected in bottles with “reversing thermometers” that cut off the mercury to preserve temperatures measured in the ocean at depth to be read later aboard. Salinity was measured at sea by tedious chemical titrations. Imagine doing all of this from a rocking and rolling shallow draft cutter that bounces in icy seas for 10 weeks within fog much of the time. No radar to warn of icebergs either, and you want to study icebergs, so you move exactly where they are or where you think they are coming from. And they though that the Titanic was unsinkable.

Iceberg in the fog off Upernarvik, Greenland in July of 2003. [Photo Credit: Andreas Muenchow]

Iceberg in the fog off Upernavik, Greenland in July of 2003. [Photo Credit: Andreas Muenchow]

USCGC Healy in northern Baffin Bay in July 2003 with iceberg. Ellesmere Island is in the background.

USCGC Healy in northern Baffin Bay in July 2003 with iceberg. Ellesmere Island is in the background.

The 1928 Marion Expedition was the first US Coast Guard survey in Baffin Bay while the last such expedition took place 2003. Unlike “Iceberg” Smith we then had military grade GPS, radar, and sonar systems. These sensor systems allowed me to directly measure ocean currents from the moving ship every minute continuously from the surface to about 600 meters down. Oh, we also took water samples in bottles, but temperature, depth, and salinity are all measured electronically about 24 times every second. As a result we can actually test, if the physics that had to be assumed to be true in 1928 actually are true. As it turns out, the old theory to estimate currents from temperature and salinity sections works well off Canada, but not so well off Greenland. Furthermore, we found several eddies or vortices in the ocean from the current profiling sonars.

And finally, it took Edward H. “Iceberg” Smith only 3 years to publish most of his data and insightful interpretations while I am still working on both his and my own data 85 years and 10 years later, respectively. Sure, I got more data from a wider range of moored, ship-borne, and air-borne sensors, but I do wonder, if I really consider my data and interpretations as careful and think as thorough as LCDR Smith did. Furthermore, he had no computers and performed all calculations, crafted all graphs, and typed all reports tediously by hand. I would not want to trade, but all this makes me admire his skills, dedication, and accomplishments even more.

Dr Helen Johnson on acoustic Doppler current profiler (sonar to measure ocean velocity) watch aboard the USCGC Healy in Baffin Bay in 2003. [Photo credit: Andreas Muenchow]

Dr Helen Johnson on acoustic Doppler current profiler (sonar to measure ocean velocity) watch aboard the USCGC Healy in Baffin Bay in 2003. [Photo credit: Andreas Muenchow]

P.S.: The New Yorker has three stories on the subject published in 1938, 1949, and 1959. I eagerly await to read those.

ResearchBlogging.orgSmith, E. (1928). EXPEDITION OF U. S. COAST GUARD CUTTER MARION TO THE REGION OF DAVIS STRAIT IN 1928 Science, 68 (1768), 469-470 DOI: 10.1126/science.68.1768.469

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Posted in Oceanography, Polar Exploration

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Camels in Arctic Canada, Nature Reports

Posted on March 5, 2013 by | 2 Comments

Camels roamed freely the boreal forests of Arctic Canada ages ago. Today, Natalia Rybczynski of the Canadian Museum of Nature in Ottawa published such findings in Nature Communications with Canadian and British scientists. Margaret Munro has the full story.

Illustration of the High Arctic camel on Ellesmere Island during the Pliocene warm period, about three and a half million years ago. [Credit: Julius Csotonyi/Canadian Museum of Nature]

Illustration of the High Arctic camel on Ellesmere Island during the Pliocene warm period, about three and a half million years ago. [Credit: Julius Csotonyi/Canadian Museum of Nature]

My first impression was that of hoax, but here is what the original science article says in the abstract:

Moreover, we report that these deposits have yielded the first evidence of a High Arctic camel, identified using collagen fingerprinting of a fragmentary fossil limb bone. Camels originated in North America and dispersed to Eurasia via the Bering Isthmus, an ephemeral land bridge linking Alaska and Russia. The results suggest that the evolutionary history of modern camels can be traced back to a lineage of giant camels that was well established in a forested Arctic.

Now, the camel is dead for 3.5 million years. It lived at a time when the earth’s climes, oceans, glaciers, and mountains were all different from what they are today with many ice ages that came and went. Bone fragments of this ancient camel were preserved by ice ages long past and today’s cold and dry desert climate of Ellesmere Island.

Good stuff comes out of Canada, and this includes Rick Mercer’s rant about Scientists in Canada 2013.

Rybczynski, N., Gosse, J., Richard Harington, C., Wogelius, R., Hidy, A., & Buckley, M. (2013). Mid-Pliocene warm-period deposits in the High Arctic yield insight into camel evolution Nature Communications, 4 DOI: 10.1038/ncomms2516

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Posted in Polar Exploration, Wild Life

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Book Review: Terra Incognita by Sara Wheeler

Posted on February 27, 2013 by | Leave a comment

Ms. Wheeler is not the touchy-feely kind when she describes scientists and technicians in Antarctica during the 7-month that she spent with them in science camps. She turns awes and wonders into a refreshing set of stories about people and places. At a fast clip she surprises with delightful encounters describing a different breed of people in a different land. “Terra Incognita” is not all ice, mountains, deserts, and hardship, but it is about the people who live and work there. As a scientist I felt at times described like a caged animal on display in her writing. She pokes fun of subjects and self that the feeble may not always like. Her book made me laugh and smile often. It still does.

terra-incognita-by-sara-wheeler

The people in Ms. Wheeler’s book reminded me of many companions that I lived with in close quarters working on Arctic research vessels and out of remote field camps. She succeeds to show the essence of men and women who live science. With humor and gripping commentary she depicts the human side of science well. This is travel writing at its very best, ever since Bruce Chatwin stopped writing. Along with Ms. Wheeler’s first book “Travels in a Thin country” that is Chile, “Terra Incognita” reflects a healthy thirst for life, people, and wanderlust.

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Reflection: One keeper, many souls

Posted on February 17, 2013 by | 1 Comment

Reblogged from The Fourth Continent:

Click to visit the original post

According to Inuit culture in Greenland, a person possesses six or seven souls. The souls take the form of tiny people scattered throughout the body.

By Annie Dillard.

I don't know much about this yet, but the idea of six or seven souls sounds almost overbearing. With just one soul, you can feel enough love, and in times of sorrow, too much pain.

Read more… 72 more words

I just came across these beautiful words and imagery of "A young lady venturing Far North"

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Posted in Polar Exploration, Uncategorized

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Antarctic Plane Crash Kills 3 Canadians

Posted on February 8, 2013 by | 1 Comment

Polar research requires ships, planes, and helicopters to supply bases and move people, instruments, fuel, and food to places where instruments need to placed, recovered, or serviced. While these activities are fairly routine and safe where most of us live, they are neither routine nor safe in extreme cold, extreme winds, or extremely remote places such as Arctic Canada, Greenland, or Antarctica.

I just learnt from an NSF Press Release that a Kenn Borek Twin Otter crashed into Mount Elizabeth in the Queen Alexandra Range of the Transantarctic Mountains at an elevation of about 3,900 m or 11,000 feet less than 2 weeks ago. All three Canadian crew aboard were killed. The plane was in transit from a research station at the South Pole to the Italian station at Terra Nova Bay to support Italian field work.

A memorial ceremony for the aircrew at NSF's Amundsen-Scott South Pole Station [Photo Credit: Blaise Kuo Tiong, NSF]

A memorial ceremony for the aircrew at NSF’s Amundsen-Scott South Pole Station [Photo Credit: Blaise Kuo Tiong, NSF]

Here are the words of Dr. Kelly Falkner, Director of NSF’s Polar Division (source):

January 28, 2013
On behalf of the U.S. National Science Foundation and all in the U. S. Antarctic Program, I wish to extend our profound sympathies to the families, friends, and colleagues of the three Kenn Borek Twin Otter crew, whose deaths in Antarctica while en route to support the Italian national Antarctic science program have recently been confirmed.

We have been privileged to experience first-hand their professionalism, skill, and dedication to the arduous task of supporting science in an extremely remote and inhospitable environment. In many ways, their contributions make possible hard won but vital advances in scientific knowledge that serve all of mankind. Although everyone associated with the pursuit of science in Antarctica makes personal sacrifices to do so, very infrequently and sadly, some make the ultimate sacrifice.

While it may come as little consolation at this very sorrowful time, the families, friends, and colleagues of the crew members should know that the thoughts of everyone in the U.S. Antarctic Program were with them through the long ordeal of the past few days and remain so now.

To the families and friends of the crew, I commend your loved ones for their commitment and dedication to their profession and offer our condolences. The sense of loss is keenly felt throughout the U.S. program and no doubt throughout the international Antarctic community.

-NSF-

I am also thinking of Marty Bergmann, a Canadian Polar scientist turned administrator. He perished 2 summers ago in a plane crash outside Resolute, Nunavut in the Canadian High Arctic working his Government Canada job to tirelessly help others in their Arctic research. Unlike the photo below, I remember him with a massive ear-to-ear grin on his face and a twinkle in his eye.

The Royal Canadian Geographic Society will recognize Martin Bergmann, the director of the Polar Continental Shelf Program who died in a plane crash in Resolute last year, by creating a medal for excellence in Arctic leadership, science and exploration. [Credit: CBC News]

Martin Bergmann, Director of the Polar Continental Shelf Program who died in a plane crash in Resolute Aug.-20, 2011. [Credit: CBC News]

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Shots of Airborne Lasers at Petermann Gletscher, Greenland

Posted on November 25, 2012 by | Leave a comment

If shots of whiskey make you dizzy, shots of laser stun. NASA stunned me this week, when I discovered that they provide millions such shots of Greenland from which to construct detailed images of the landscape. The shots are free, no age-limit. This is better than the usual remote sensing or photography of “just” brightness. The laser gives us height, and not just the perception of it by shadows and fake angles of illumination, but hard and direct measurements of, well, height above sea level. Have a look at several million such shots of Petermann Gletscher taken in 2010 before the glacier broke to Manhattan-sized pieces:

Petermann Glacier surface elevation from laser shots on Mar.-24, 2010 at the site where the Manhattan-sized ice island formed Aug.-6, 2010. The background shows the same scene at the same time at 250-m resolution from MODIS (see below). Colors along the 350-m wide laser track line show height above sea level in meters.

Petermann Glacier on March 24, 2010 as seen from MODIS satellite at 250-m resolution with two flight tracks along which laser data are collected. The black box shows the site of the figure above. The color figure on the right shows the slope or gradients of the data shown on left. It emphasizes regions where brightness changes fast. Multivariate calculus is useful!

We see two tracks: the one on right (east) has the ice stick more than 20-m above sea level (yellow colors) while about a mile to left (west) the ice’s surface elevation is only 10-m above sea level (light blue). Since the ice is floating and densities of ice and water are known, we can invert this height into an ice thickness. Independent radar measurements from the same track prove that this “hydrostatic” force balance holds, the glacier is indeed floating, so, multiply surface elevation by 10 and you got a good estimate of ice thickness. The dark blue colors of thin ice show meandering rivers and streams, ponds and undulations, as well as a rift or hairline fracture from east to west. This rift is visible both in the right and left track, it is the line along which the glacier will break to form the 2010 ice island. All ice towards the top of this rift has long left the glacier and some of it has hit Newfoundland as seen from the International Space Station by astronaut Ron Garan:

Last remnant of Petermann Ice Island 2010-A as seen from the International Space Station on Aug.-29, 2011 when it was about 3.5 km wide and 3 km long [Photo credit: Ron Garan, NASA]

Both are images of Petermann ice. The photo measures the brightness that hits the lens, but the laser measures both brightness and ice thickness. The laser acts like flash photography: When it is dark, we use a flash to provide the light to make the object “bright.” Now imagine that your camera also measures the time between the flash leaving your camera and brightness from a reflecting object to return it. What you think happens at an instant actually takes time as light travels fast, but not infinitely fast. So you need a very exact clock to measure the distance from your camera to the object. Replace the flash of the camera with a laser, replace the lens of your camera with a light detector and a timer, place the device on a plane, and you got yourself an airborne topographic altimeter. So, what use is there for this besides making pretty and geeky pictures?

The laser documents some of the change in “climate change.” Greenland’s glaciers and ice-sheets are retreating and shrinking. Measuring the surface and bottom of the ice over Greenland with lasers and radars gives ice thickness. The survey lines above were flown in 2002, 2003, 2007, 2010, and 2011. These data are a direct and accurate measure on how much ice is lost or gained at Petermann Gletscher and what is causing it. My bet is on the oceans which in Nares Strait and Petermann Fjord have increased the last 10 years to melt the floating glacier from below.

There is more, but Mia Zapata of the Gits sings hard of “Another Shot of Whiskey.” What a voice …

ResearchBlogging.org

Johnson, H., Münchow, A., Falkner, K., & Melling, H. (2011). Ocean circulation and properties in Petermann Fjord, Greenland Journal of Geophysical Research, 116 (C1) DOI: 10.1029/2010JC006519

Krabill, W., Abdalati, W., Frederick, E., Manizade, S., Martin, C., Sonntag, J., Swift, R., Thomas, R., & Yungel, J. (2002). Aircraft laser altimetry measurement of elevation changes of the greenland ice sheet: technique and accuracy assessment Journal of Geodynamics, 34 (3-4), 357-376 DOI: 10.1016/S0264-3707(02)00040-6

Münchow, A., Falkner, K., Melling, H., Rabe, B., & Johnson, H. (2011). Ocean Warming of Nares Strait Bottom Waters off Northwest Greenland, 2003–2009 Oceanography, 24 (3), 114-123 DOI: 10.5670/oceanog.2011.62

Thomas, R., Frederick, E., Krabill, W., Manizade, S., & Martin, C. (2009). Recent changes on Greenland outlet glaciers Journal of Glaciology, 55 (189), 147-162 DOI: 10.3189/002214309788608958

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Posted in Ice Island, Petermann Glacier, Polar Exploration

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CCGS Henry Larsen: More on People, Places, and Services

Posted on September 13, 2012 by | 2 Comments

The Canadian Coast Guard Ship is powered by such a diverse and talented group of women and men from Newfoundland, Labrador, and beyond, that one or even two posts here hardly do justice to describe how well they run their ship and its many facilities that many mid-sized cities do not have. Monday I wrote about the people who run the power plant and electric departments as well as the seamen who fight fires and run fishing fleet and port facilities. Today I want to show the airport and talk a little about the civil administration that oversees and manages all aboard the ship.

Landing deck of the CCGS Henry Larsen with aircraft preparing for take-off to survey the ice conditions ahead. Shown are Chief Officer Brian Legge (far right) who is in command of the airport and is talking to Pilot Don Dobbin (2nd from right), scientist Renske Gelderloos (3rd from right), Ice Services Specialist Erin Clarke (4th from right), and Helicopter Engineer Pierre Autran performs last checks inside the helicopter. [Photo Credit: Canadian Coast Guard Ship Henry Larsen]

The airport consists of hangar, landing pad, helicopter, traffic control, and fire fighting stations. Don Dobbin was our pilot and Pierre Autran his engineer who was pulled out of retirement for this trip. Incidentally, Pierre and I had sailed together on the same ship in 1993 more than 200 miles north of eastern Siberia. Then all flights were prohibited by Russian aviation authorities: Politics were different 20 years ago, one hopes. No such threat of being shot down existed this year between Greenland and Canada, but for severe ice conditions and poor internet connections, the airport was very busy almost every day for both ice surveys ahead and behind the ship. It also supported landing parties to set up and/or service 4 weather stations.

Helicopter pilot Don Dobbin with scientist Dave Riedel on Hans Island servicing a weather station in the center of Nares Strait. Ellesmere Island in the background. [Photo Credit: Allison Einolf, Minnesota]

The air traffic control takes place both on the flight deck where Chief Officer Brian Legge is in charge and from the bridge where the officer-of-the-deck is in overall command as either First Officer Chris Steward or Second Officer Rebecca Acton-Bond place the ship, alert the entire ship, and often oversee other science operations as well. All of these are demanding jobs, all these jobs need precision in the concise communication of orders and permissions granted or denied as well as execution of all operations, because helicopter operations are probably one of the most dangerous and critical operations possible on the ship.

Attention to detail, clear communication, and calm execution lower the risk of death and destruction that helicopters can and often do cause. The National Science Foundation sent me to a 4-day course in helicopter safety and what to do if accidents happen over water or on land. It was a sobering course. For this reason, perhaps, Captain Wayne Duffett is almost always on the deck during flight operations, but as all good chief executives, he lets his officers and navigators run the operations but is available for help on consultation should it be needed.

Second Officer and navigator Rebecca Acton-Bond on a sunday on the bridge of the CCGS Henry Larsen in August of 2012 in Nares Strait. [Photo Credit: Canadian Coast Guard, Kirk McNeil, Labrador]

Leading Seaman and helmsman Melvin Cobb on the bridge. [Photo Credit: Canadian Coast Guard Ship Henry Larsen]

The navigator always works with a helmsman or quartermaster who steers the ship following instructions of the officer of the deck, they are on the look-out for ice and bergs to find the best routes. “Best” here refers to the route that requires the least amount of ice breaking. So, if there is one thing that icebreakers like the Larsen are really good at, it is how to avoid ice, because it is a violent and high-energy activity. Fuel is not cheap and less ice is broken, the faster and more efficient the tasks at hand can be accomplished.

And as all people on the ship, everyone has more than one job and this includes the helmsmen and quartermasters like Melvin Cobb or firefighters like Derick Stone, Carl Rose, Paul Gillingham, and Rueben Hillier. They are often members of the deck crew that help landing parties to get ashore and stay save while ashore. This involves the zodiac as well as guns to protect from polar bears:

Seamen Paul Gillingham and Rueben Hillier in the zodiac steered by Chief Officer Brian Legge in Alexandra Fjord, Ellesmere Island on Aug.-13, 2012. A tide gauge was recovered and re-deployed near this site. [Photo Credit: Canadian Coast Ship Henry Larsen, Barbara O'Connell]

Zodiac launched for a landing part to dismantle a weather station at Cape Baird, Ellesmere Island. Chief Officer Brian Legge at the helm with Melvin Cobb and Derick Stone in the back and center left of the boat filled with scientists Humfrey Melling, David Riedel, Andreas Muenchow, and Renske Geldeloos. [Photo Credit: Canadian Coast Guard Ship Henry Larsen]

Landing party at Cape Baird, Ellesmere Island to dismantle a weather station. Scientists David Riedel (foreground) and Humfrey Melling (background) are protected by Melvin Cobb (with gun) from polar bears. View is towards the north-west across Lady Franklin Bay to the west of Nares Strait. [Photo Credit: Renske Gelderloos, Oxford University]

Taking down a weather station on Cape Baird, Ellesmere Island, view is to the south-west. People from right to left, the author, David Riedel (kneeling), Melvin Cobb, and Humfrey Melling (covered). [Photo Credit: Renske Gelderloos, Oxford University]

Polar bear on an ice floe in Kennedy Channel as seen from the bridge as the ship was approaching a station a day’s polar bear walk from Cape Baird. [Photo Credit: Canadian Coast Guard Ship Henry Larsen]

There is still more to describe such as the hospital, the restaurant and bar, as well as the superior fishing of sailors and fishermen from Newfoundland to find and hook valuable items such as sensors and computers that some scientists left unattended for 3 or 5 or 9 years at the bottom of the unspoiled seas that border Arctic Greenland and Canada. There will be more … as there are more great people who make great science possible.

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CCGS Henry Larsen: People, Places, Services

Posted on September 10, 2012 by | Leave a comment

The Canadian Coast Guard Ship Henry Larsen sailed this summer on a challenging science mission to Nares Strait, Petermann Glacier, and beyond. It reached its farthest North ever at 82 degrees and 15 minutes North latitude. This week I like to focus on the 39 people who make this ship what it really is: a complex community with all the functionality of a city. Captain Wayne Duffett is in overall command. His job will overwhelm lesser minds as he has to manage an airport, a fire department, a power plant, a sanitation department, a hospital, a restaurant, a hotel, a supermarket, a weather station, a port facility, a civil administration, etc., etc. Oh yeah, The CCGS Henry Larsen is also a ship that he moves through ice in uncharted waters to support 8 scientists from 3 countries. All of this is done with only 22 crew and 17 officers who work around the clock on a variety of schedules.

CCGS Henry Larsen next to the Petermann Ice Island PII-2012 on Aug.-10, 2012. The south-western tip of PII-2012 at the bottom right of the image was used by Captain Wayne Duffett as a reference point for the motion of PII-2012. The exact place of this point was monitored at hourly intervals via helicopter while the ship was operating inside the fjord landward of the ice island. [Photo Credit: Canadian Coast Guard Ship Henry Larsen/Jo Poole]


Canadian Coast Guard Ship Henry Larsen at the entrance to Petermann Fjord on Aug.-10, 2012. The ice island PII-2012 is in the background with puddles on sea ice in the foreground. Polaris Bay, Greenland is in the far back. [Photo Credit: CCGS Henry Larsen and Jo Poole.]

The ship may occupy an area of only 2,000 m^2 (100 meters long and 20 meters wide), but it functions as a self-contained universe at sea. Perhaps the most important and largest department with 13 people is the power plant that produces energy to move the ship and to provide electricity and heat to make all other departments’ work possible. The 13 members are quiet and thoughtful men often working in the background in cramped, hot, and dirty spaces below decks. It is very hard to get good pictures of them, but here are two, one of Chief Engineer William Derraugh and Second Electrical Officer Anatoly Eltsov:

Chief Engineer William Derraugh on the bridge of the CCGS Henry Larsen in Aug.-2012 with Senior Scientist Dr. Humfrey Melling. [Photo Credit: Barb O'Connell, Canadian Coast Guard.]


Electrical Officer Anatoly Eltsov during a thoughtful moment on the bridge of the Canadian Coast Ship Henry Larsen in Nares Strait. [Photo Credit: Kirk McNeil, Canadian Coast Guard]

The second-largest department is the fire department that also run the port facilities, the fishing fleet, and provide general support on deck, on the bridge, on the water, and on land to a range of activities. There are nine men in this department that are led by the boatswain or bosun Don Barnable with Chief Officer Brian Legge in command. The men of this department are perhaps the most vocal and visible on the ship as they work so many jobs wearing many hats, uniforms, and arms. I can and will fill entire picture galleries of their work, here are just three images that barely serve as teasers, perhaps:

Boatswain Don Barnable and Seaman Derick Stone working at the airport aboard the CCGS Henry Larsen as traffic control and fire fighter, respectively. [Photo Credit: Jo Poole, British Columbia]


Zodiac of the CCGS Henry Larsen recovering a mooring in Kennedy Channel on Aug.-6 with Chief Officer Brian Legge at the helm. Ellesmere Island, Canada is in the background. [Photo Credit: Canadian Coast Guard Ship Henry Larsen]


Deck crew of CCGS Henry Larsen led by boatswain Don Barnable (white helmet) recovering a mooring over the side where the zodiac delivered it to the crane. Two scientists in the background waiting for the deck to be secure. [Photo Credit: Canadian Coast Guard Ship Henry Larsen]

I will have to stop here for now, and will report tomorrow and thursday about the logistics, communication, aviation, hospital, and civil administration departments. There is just too much going on aboard a ship that acts like a complex, advanced, and very mobile city. And with mobile I do not just mean a structure of steel, but a structure made of sailors, navigators, scientists, and engineers.

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