June 15, 2016

Out of camp

Iben and Helen digging the 2.2 m pit for the shallow drilling.

The good weather continued and allowed for outdoor work. After lunch, a group of four went 12 km to the NW of camp to drill an 11m shallow core.
EGRIP is situated in the middle of the North East Greenland Ice Stream and moves about 60 m per year towards the ice margin. The ice outside the ice stream moves much slower and the shearing zone that defines the edge of the ice stream is an interesting place to study ice dynamics.
The shallow core was drilled right at the shearing zone and the borehole will have an ‘egg’ introduced later this season (as yesterday’s borehole). For the case of bad weather or technical issues, the group brought two skidoos and sledges, a tent, Iridium phone, and GPS to the drill site.
Although a thick ground fog came in very suddenly just before the return, it was unnecessary to navigate by the GPS as tracks from the outward journey were still visible. Everybody got home for a nice dinner and the ice core was safely stored in the cold trench.

What we have done today:

1. Moving equipment into Viessmann workshop in drill trench
2. Fighting leak in casing at Swiss drill test site
3. Drilled 11m shallow core EGRIP 2016 EGG CORE 2 with hand auger
4. Sampled surface snow from EGRIP to EGG CORE 2 position
5. Resampled snow surface profile in the clean snow area

Ad. 3: The 11 m EGRIP 2016 – EGG core 2 for the ETracer Project was drilled from the bottom of a 2.20 m deep pit located some 12 km NW of camp at N 75.7062 W 36.2979.

Weather today: Sunny and calm day with some occasional clouds. Temp. -4°C to -10°C. Wind 0-5 kt starting S and turning E. At around 18L a thick ground fog rolled in.

FL, Anders Svensson

Kerim and Niccolo in the pit drilling the core.