There's lots of snow in Boulder right now. It's too early for snow, but the dogs like it.




This is sunrise just the day before!

Waiting and Packing

Oct. 8, 2009
"Here's a picture to brighten you day. Right now we're holding just outside of the Chilean border waiting for the pilot to show up. I can see oil rigs in the distance. We need to take the picarro down this AM and then keep packing up."

Cape Horn

Ship tracker turned back on!

Land oh

Email from Michael this morning:

"I woke up this morning to calm seas, sunny skies (with some clouds on top) and islands in the distance. After a naval shower I looked out the port side on my way to breakfast and there was Cape Horn.

Almost there!"

On the way home

Hi Everyone,
Sorry I've been negligent posting here, but I didn't get any emails from Michael for a while then they piled up when I was busy. There's been no update on the map of the Gould, but I know they've left Palmer. Timeline is still unclear though. Here are his answers to some of my questions and some other happenings. Enjoy and Happy Weekend!

Wednesday, Sept. 30:
The weather here has been good by the standards. Cloudy for the most part, but the winds have been calm. That is until today. It started off nice and sunny but around 3 this afternoon it turned foul and hasn't let up since. The pressure dropped off of the charts and we've had sustained 40-50 kt winds with blowing snow. It's pretty awesome to see such an even where the snow gets picked up and plastered to any vertical surface. It's also really neat to walk into the lee of a building or such and listen to the erie peacefulness of the howling winds, and also watching the turbulent flows.

I have been sleeping (and eating for the most part) on the ship while we're docked here. We had to plow through a solid sheet of ice to be able to dock here at Palmer, but other than that its been avoiding the occasional small iceberg. The ship isn't really an ice breaker, it's just rated to go through a foot of first year ice at steady speed. Apparently in a previous year the captain had to come in and break up the ice at station and then do many doughnuts to clear it all out. This year we just came in backed out a little bit and then turned the boat around to face the proper way (starboard to the dock).

As for me I've been using a good deal of my time around here helping out with the station kitchen, trying to problem solve some of the issues with the oxygen titration, skiing a bit, and catching up on classes. For classes I've caught up on the lectures, but I still have several fluids HWs looming over my head. It has been an intense few days of watching videos and taking notes, but it sure is nice to have the videos.

We are slated to shove off at 1600 local tomorrow. It think the plan is to try Hugo a 2nd time. The winds should have pushed the ice that was in the way out of the way, but then again those same winds will make landing stupid. Sonja and a couple others from the raytheon crew are the ones that would land using a zodiac. The mission isn't that critical, it's just a GPS that is measuring changes in altitude for glacial rebound. If we can't get it now the LMG will be back in a few weeks for the first round of summer station scientist and they can try again then.

Thursday, Oct.1:
Just an update on our runnings around. We tried again for Hugo island last night and I think the ice was too much again, so during the night we turned around to head for a cast site for the LTER (Long Term Ecological Research). LTER is one of the big projects that goes on down here every summer. Anyway after we get there I think we'll give Hugo one more go. Oh also Bjorn, the guy in charge of the station at Hugo island is Jocelynns husband [Jocelyn is an awesome woman who works in our division at NOAA in Boulder doing carbon14 dating to trace Greenhouse Gasses (GHGs)], so Colm feels a bit more pressure to try and fix the GPS. It's been a bit iffy if we really need to get this done now anyway. We've been getting a wishy washy message from phone calls as to whether or not it is of high importance.

Friday, Oct.2:
Today was a mostly sunny day so we could see land and icebergs most of the time. There was one iceberg that looked like it was calving, but I think it was really waves just getting shot up the side. I don't remember what I last told you about our plans, but we couldn't find a good place this AM to land at Hugo. We went out for several hours and did a cast around 11 local and now we're back hanging out at Hugo waiting to see if it's good in the AM (now ish for you). I hope that this will be our last try at Hugo even though we have more time on teh schedule. Some additional time in/around PA would be nice. One of the electronics techs on board has a house down here so he knows the area well and could point us to a good day trip if we have time.

Oh and supposedly there was a whale this afternoon, but I missed that while working on fluids. I'm trying to balance work with seeing the sights.

Saturday, Oct.3:
We're still sitting on Hugo. I don't know why we're wasting our time, but it is what it is. i guess some of the lingering is because the Drake is supposed to be bad right now (I'd like to see a bad Drake).

Hugo: take 2 or more

The LM Gould is setting sail for Hugo Island once again where we'll be trying to fix a GPS receiver that is measuring glacial rebound. If the ice and/or wind doesn't stop us we'll head on back to Punta Arenas with maybe one or 2 more CTD casts along the way plus a buoy deployment.

More pictures are up.

More Pictures!

Here are some of the highlight pictures (and a video) so far from my POV. I'm sure I'll be able to grab pictures from other people, but for now with the limited bandwidth just the highlights.

The events so far at Palmer have consisted of getting others settled here, and going skiing on the Glacier. The best snow of the season is now apparently so it's the best time to ski, but even at that it's not very good by a global standard.

We are likely off the Hugo Island for a day or so to fix the GPS on a weather station there. hopefully we'll beat the bad weather there and then we'll make it back to Palmer here to wrap everything up before heading back to Punta Arenas for good.

Arrived!

Michael and Company arrived last night at Palmer Station on the Antarctic Penninsula. Since he's at the base now hopefully he will be able to upload pictures and we can see some of what he's been seeing. Then again, he mentioned that he might be going xc skiing on a glacier near the station today, so he might not have time to use the internet all day. Yeah, I'm here grading labs, doing homework, and attending lectures. He's out skiing on glaciers. I think it sounds like a pretty fair trade, no?

Here's several of his most recent messages to tide us over until pictures arrive:
"Around mid day yesterday we saw out first land in a while. It was Smith Island and man was it amazing! The lower level was shrouded by a cloud bank, but it was amazing to see the tall pointy peaks coming strait out of the ocean. Right about now we're supposed to be going through this spectacular strait, but the snow is heavy so there isn't much to see. Maybe better luck on the way north.

I suppose you know too, from my last email, that we are in the islands and it foggy/snowy. Even with that a smallish iceberg went by that was amazing with it's blue caverns cut into the side. Such texture! We will get to Palmer today, but won't be able to dock until the AM (friday) unless the weather clears. Apparently they have XC skis there where we can go ski on the glacier so Sonja, another USAP person, and I are going to go do that. I'll be ready to tear up the snow with my XC skis when I get kacb. ;)


We did get into station earlier than we had scheduled (bad weather buffer), so our return plans are a bit iffy. It looks like we will be here till Thursday night and then sail over to Hugo Island to work on a remote weather station there. We have 3 full days scheduled there and then be back in PA on the 9th. This Monday is supposed to be a Station break day so Colm isn't too happy about wasting a day sitting here (he wants to get back ASAP to take care of stuff). If the weather is good at Hugo, then we'll leave when that's done and maybe do a couple CTD stops on the way back to PA. If this were the case we'd get to PA early. From that I don't know if Raytheon would pay for the different ticket, so I'm not sure how that'll go. I'll keep you up to date as I know things. Just wanted to let you know.

I've been able very slowly get the class videos onto my computer. So far about 1/3 done. Hopefully that'll keep me busy downloading and watching for the next week."

Land Ho!

Good afternoon. I suppose it will be around noon when you can first read this.

This morning was quite beautiful with a great variety. We (Ken, Harriet, Colm, a couple of the transit crew, and I) just finished collecting cast #18 when the sun started to rise. the sky was mostly cloudy from the snow we had encountered earlier in the morning. There was small pancake ice floating in the water and the sun was trying to peak through the clouds. Not too long after that the large field of pancake ice diminished and turned in to many parallel streaks of the pancakes going off at an angle from the ship. I could see petrels flying off on the edge of the boat lights, even a couple giant petrels.

I went back down to do some work in the O2 lab and when I finished up the ice had returned in full to larger lily pad like ice that was ~2m across. I got some nice pictures/video of this. Again shortly there after the snow returned with the large lily pad ice, but I could still see the edge of blue sky to the south with yellow sky to the north. Now at breakfast the sky is clear, the sun is out for the first time in several days, the ice is gone, and the wind is clam. All within a few hours and not many miles traveled.

Last night was also very cool with the blowing snow (40 kt. winds). I went up to the bridge with Sonja and Mark. The wind was from the NE so it was quartering out back. From the bridge we could see the undisturbed free-stream flow, and then the turbulent flow coming off of the bridge. What made it especially interesting is that out 3-D anemometer mounted on a pole ahead of the bridge was in the variable area with the laminar and turbulent flows, so it should be interesting to look at that data.

The cable that holds the rosette sustained some damage on it's way in from cast #18, so we are siting at station 19 now waiting for the fix (another 2 hours or so). Otherwise the going has been slower than usual because of the ice. When the times get icy we have to slow down and deice the engine coolant water (I don't know how this happens). Ultimately that means we go 6kts instead of 10. The last 2 casts should be fairly short though since we've hit the trench and are on the shallow side of it now. I hope I'm awake to see the sights when we first hit the peninsular coast. Deception Island sounds like it's a really neat place but I think our chances of going there are very small.

The engines just shut down while we're waiting...the ship is so much quieter now.

I'm not sure what time we'll make it down to the peninsular islands, but I hope it's during the day time and that I'm awake too. The last couple of days I've been going to bed after finishing lunch and then getting up around 1900. It's really fun to watch the Cape Petrels fly around the boat without having to flap at all. Even when they drop down to catch some food (I suppose) then never really stop flying, then just let their feet touch and dip their beak into the water while keeping their wings spread out. It's really amazing that they can fly faster than the boat without really loosing any altitude; it boggles my mind how petrels and albatross can do what they do. The water is a really pretty blue out in the deep ocean. The undisturbed water is a nice deep blue with maybe a bit of purple hue to it, but when air gets mixed into the water you get the nice aquamarine color found in the tropical island waters.

Smooth Sailing

They're out in the open sea now and it appears to be going well.
Again from Michael:
Yesterday, Fri. Sept.18: Yarr me mate. Ye best post up on some pirate talk day yarr. Temorra is international talk like me, ye space pirate, day. Yarr!

Today, Sunday Sept. 20: Hello again. Things have been going along at a good rate here. The weather has been amazing for the drake Passage. There has only been one bad-ish day, which resulted in a good amount of water coming into the room where the rosette is housed. Once the rosette was back up though there were no problems, just more water moving around the floor. Other than that the seas have been gently rocking. I heard the Captain say to a new crew member that this is the calmest you'll ever see in the Drake. Hopefully it'll stay this way until the sampling gets done and then I'd be up for some good storms. We are running short on one of the chemicals needed for the oxygen titration, but we'll see if we can substitute some KI for some NaI. Should be the same, we just need the I ion. The temp took a turn south yesterday from about 4 C to -1.5 now. Apparently it snowed some yesterday, but I slept through it; it is flurrying abit right now, but nothing notable. The crew enjoyed talk like a pirate day yesterday. Yarrr.

I suppose that's all for now.

Good morning!

On the Ocean

Hi All, I received this email from Michael today saying he started his trip. I've included an image of the ship tracker showing where he's been so far. Looks like they're still pretty close to the coast of Chile, but soon they'll be out in the Drake Passage proper.

"Hey there. We got underway today without much fanfare. We've got the first 24hrs or so to get all of our testing techniques down pat. Today Mark and I with the help of Sonja trouble shot all of the problems we've been encountering with the O2 titration system. We think that one either the reagent, or the titrant are mix it a slightly wrong proportion. Colm made up a second titrant solution tonight maybe we'll see what that does for us tomorrow. It looks like I'll be taking the later shift opposed to Mark on the O2 system hopefully we can get some of the transit group to help us out and make the load not so bad.

It has been fun work so far and that's especially appreciated because they have been long hours (~18) a day. Apparently on of Sonja's hobbies is to make neck warmers and she let us go through and pick one out. I had a tough decision, but I ultimately ended up with a bumble bee and honey comb pattern. I'll see if I can get some pictures tomorrow of the land in the distance. I don't think we'll be out of the straits before 5 ET tomorrow (9/17) and at that we might linger a bit to let some 35ft seas pass us by. Even at that there are supposed to be storms every 3 days or so. In the passage the seas are not bad for a ship this size. I'd say they are equivalent to the roughest weather i saw during the EC coming around Cape Ramano off of San Marco Island."

And then from 3PM ET today:
"I'm off to sleep now. try to be ready for the first night of sampling. We've still had trouble with the o2 system, but it's mostly the equipment we've determined, so we'll just have to keep consistent our selves."

To Punta Arenas

Here are the highlights pictures.

It was kind of funny... I went from this to this.

Maybe more tomorrow.

Drake Passage Cruise

Start: Punta Arenas, Chile
September 16, 2009

Pausing: Palmer Station, Antarctica
September 27 - October 3, 2009

Finish: Punta Arenas, Chile
October 9, 2009

Follow the LM Gould at SailWX