Greenland 2005 Journal

Friday, July 22, 2005

This morning, John and Torry departed in the Tucker SnoCat around mid-morning to survey another transect between Summit and the GRIP ice core site. This traverse is expected to take about 8 hours and should get them back to camp around dinner time. Tim, Pannir and David took the plane-wave radar to the edge of the clean air area, and pushed the radar sled to a snow accumulation measurement area called the bamboo forest. Every week throughout the year snow accumulation is measured by the Summit science technicians. Measurements were made around the boundary of the bamboo forest and through the center.

The weather continues to be great � blue skies and light winds. This is the result of a high pressure system that is sitting over Greenland. This system has been dominating our weather for the past week, giving us excellent working conditions. The virtual dashboard for outreach was tested with modified software, and was working well. We will begin a test transmitting over the Iridium system when the ITTC network is back up after the switchover to a new server.

All of the radars we are testing are performing great and providing us with fantastic data sets. We have now decided that the entire PRISM team will depart Summit on an LC-130 flight scheduled for next Thursday. Several of the other groups conducting experiments with us here will be leaving on a flight scheduled for Wednesday. One of the scientists leaving is Christophe Ferrari, from the Environmental Glaciology and Geophysics Laboratory at the Joseph Fourier University in France. He is analyzing the air within the snowpack for gaseous mercury with a specially designed probe. He is also collecting frozen samples from 2-meter snow pits for further mercury studies at his laboratory in France.

For lunch we were served tuna melts, pigs in blankets, cheesy mashed potatoes, and salad. Then, David, Tim, and Pannir left with the plane-wave radar sled to gather more data along a snow accumulation line where snow accumulation is measured once a month throughout the year by the Summit science technicians. After gathering data, Kirby joined them at a previously sampled location to dig a snow pit. After we prepared the pit, visible internal layers were identified, snow samples were collected to determine density, and temperature measurements throughout the pit depth were recorded. The pit was filled back in and we returned to camp just in time for dinner. The traditional Saturday night pizza night was moved to Friday night, and the cooks prepared a variety of pizzas. At 8:00 pm we had a short presentation and promotional video, �Seismic in Saudi,� presented by one of the mechanics at the station who also works in Saudi Arabia on a seismic team mapping oil fields. This presentation was part of the �Science Talks� organized at the camp to give everyone a better idea of what is going on.

NOTE: This was entire journal entry, not just page 1.

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