May 9, 2018

Radar measurements, work on the surface and in the trenches

Two workers in the drill trench: Trevor and Karl Emil.

The day has been fine; but very cold again. It is difficult to start engines both on the air plane and the vehicles. Everything takes longer time. The radar plane flew a mission and camp personnel worked on the surface and in the trenches. In the trenches, snow blocks are being cut, loaded into a box sled and the pulled to the surface with a snowmobile.
This process amounts to a lot of trips with the sled; but slowly you see progress. And the progress is impressive. At dinner we were served king crabs and we celebrated Sune’s birthday.

What we did today:

1. Started to make inclined trench longer.
2. German Basler flew one 3.5 hour mission today.
3. Horizontal band saw ready for tests tomorrow.
4. Working on logging software and procedures to record data for true core orientation.
5. Removing snow around drillers cabin.
6. Walls are trimmed along one wall in science trench.
7. Setting up water vapour sampling site. Isotope measurements and eddy covariance and wind sensors running.
8. Grooming skiway.
9. Moving snow between carpenter’s and mechanic’s garage.
10. Lifting and resetting all markers on SW lead-in. Outermost markers were 4 m off line.

Weather today: Fine day. Temp. -27°C to lower than -40°C (thermometer on met. station bottoms out at -40°C). Wind: 9 kt to 12 kt from SW. Visibility: Unrestricted. Message on met station all day: “Dangerously low wind chill”

FL, J.P. Steffensen