Time to do some science!

February 28, 2019

We have today off to let our hands and feet recuperate after 3 days of -25C to -30C out in the field, collecting data to be analysed this weekend. Since writing this first sentence I was invited on a quick hike up the local peak (Platåfjellet) to see the sun, so less of a rest day, but totally worth it!

A grotty walk up Longyearbreen

One guy from our course (Martim) now has a rifle, so on Saturday we attempted a hike up Longyearbreen, the glacier near town, but the windy, white-out conditions meant we soon retreated back to our friends place for hot chocolate instead. Sunday was also pretty grotty and I was full of cold so I stayed wrapped up inside and baked some bread, ready for the days ahead.

Chilly drilling on Foxfonna

The class was split into 6 groups of 4, I was to be in the girls' group with Emma, Emmy and Ranveig. In these groups we rotated activities on 2 contrasting glaciers, Foxfonna and Dronbreen, each group having a go at ice drilling and sample collection, snowpit digging and ice coring and ground penetrating radar (GPR). For our first day we were assigned to do drilling and sampling of the icing field at Foxfonna glacier. This glacier is inaccessible by snowscooter, so we instead took a 15 minute taxi ride followed by a 10 minute bumpy commute in the band wagon (a metal box on caterpillar tracks) and then a steep hike down the glacier with snow well above our knees.
This snow presented us with a bit of an issue as the icing we were meant to be studying was hidden

Ranveig sampling snow

from view. Consequently, our morning was spent probing and digging around in the snow to try to find patches of ice that we could drill in and try (fruitlessly) to find some water. Eventually, by about 1pm some of our group had gotten incredibly cold so we hiked back up the glacier and had an early end to the day with a ride back to Longyearbyen.

Day 2 was slightly more successful, despite our depleted group. Emmy wasn't feeling up to a

Snowpit digging on Dronbreen

day in the field and the instructor that was meant to be digging snow pits with us on Dronbreen was ill, so Emma, Ranveig and I joined another depleted group (Josh, Pauline and Heidi) to do some digging with Will instead. Dronbreen was about an hours snowscooter drive from uni and presented with incredible views. The chilly weather was made much more bearable with lots of digging in order to measure temperatures and density from the snowpits. We got two 1.5x2x2 m pits dug before driving back down of the glacier as it began to turn dark (around 5pm).

The GPR snake on Dronbreen

Day 3, the final day, we had a change of plans. Due to issues with the Foxfonna site that we were meant to be going to, my original group headed back to Dronbreen for some GPR surveying (very
handy for my PhD). Our instructor for the day was a very enthusiastic Heidi from France. She kept us warm with jumping dances and running races; these were much needed as it otherwise got quite chilly slowly driving the snowscooters around the glacier, towing the snake-like GPR antennas behind. This was a great fun day with clear, pink skies, adding to the incredible views.

Girl Team (+ Heidi)

These field days were such a great experience, even if the cold was a little demanding at times! I'm still yet to perfect the technique of keeping my lunch from freezing and haven't discovered an easy way to go to the toilet when wearing a ginormous snowscooter suit but am definitely getting more used to working in arctic conditions.

These two days off should be used to prepare our data for the weekend and start writing our assignments, but when we awoke to clear skies, the temptation to see the sun was too much. Six of us made a quick hike up the very steep hill to Platåfjellet and were greeted by very welcome rays of sunshine hitting our faces for about 5 minutes. I've never been so excited to see the sun before, we were all ecstatic. After taking many photos we made quick work of heading back down, sliding on our bums down the steep slope.