Easter Sunday
It is Wednesday and we are on our second day in a row of being shut out by the weather. Yesterday it was low cloud ceiling and high winds; today the wind has abated but it has been snowing lightly since last night and the clouds are all over the mountains above us. As I think I have said before, Peter, our A-Star pilot, has to be able to see the ground at all times. So any cloud scenario that inhibits that view keeps us on the ground. Yesterday and today, I posted some photos from the Qaarsut area to Instagram (camera icon on the right)....
read moreMarathon Monday
We didn’t run 26.2 yesterday but a shout-out to all our Boston friends who did. Today was the Boston Marathon and while the elite runners were leaving Hopkinton, the Disko team was headed for Disko Island. After our aborted flight on Saturday and a nice down day for Easter, we were looking forward to a good weather day, and today did not disappoint. It was blue sky and sunshine, just like our ice sheet days and even a little warmer, only – 17 C when we landed! Like Saturday we decided that Ben, Laura, and I would go first as the radar...
read moreThe Easter Bunny
The Easter Bunny found us in Ilulissat! We were all sleep deprived but most of us were awoken by the first Easter service of the morning at the church down the street. Sometime between 7-8 am they rang the church bell to signal either the start or the end of the service. That sets off the sled dogs in town. So there was an interesting wake up call of church bells with a background chorus of dog howling! Happy Easter and good luck to all the runners tomorrow! Hope you have a nice...
read morePlanes, Helicopters, Dogs, and Icebergs
It’s snowing again. If this was a ski town, tomorrow would be a sweet powder day. Greenland in April! It is most definitely still winter here though there are plenty of signs of Arctic spring. The open ocean is free of sea ice (mostly) and the days are very long. Even at midnight last night I could still see light in the sky behind the mountain ridge out my window. Why was I up at midnight you might ask? Well the last few days have been exciting and busy. If you have been reading, you know that Thursday it was also snowing and...
read moreIce Sheet Site 2
Yesterday we thought we thought we were going to have to wait out some weather but it cleared quickly and we got out to the ice sheet again. After a long day of work we headed back to Ilulisaat but a damaged ski on the plane forced us to head to Kanger instead. After a night here we are up early to fly back to Ilulisaat to catch our helo charter out to Disko Island. Check out the Instagram photos from yesterday. Limited Internet and time means a short post!
read moreThe Ice Sheet 2: Photo Blog
Today’s post is about our day on the ice sheet yesterday. There is a lot to tell and it is probably best done with photos so this post is a photo post. The Twin Otter with our load of gear waiting to be loaded. Waiting to take off. Us in the back. Gear in the front. Flying out of Kangerlussuaq. Ice sheet is on the horizon. Foreground is the unglaciated coastal area of Greenland. Crossing onto the ice sheet. Out the left side. You can see the coastal land and then the ice. Right side with the ice sheet “pouring” down...
read moreThe Ice Sheet
Today we flew the Twin Otter to the Greenland Ice Sheet. As I said yesterday, we planned to visit two sites because high winds have forced cancellation of tomorrow’s field day. We only made it to one site today but we worked hard all day. Today was quite simply one of the most amazing days I have had anywhere, anytime, mostly because it was gorgeous, but also because we did some awesome science, and finally because it was fairly extreme. It was crystal clear so the flying and scenery were spectacular. When we landed on the ice...
read morePrep day (and tax day)
Your taxes were due today. Hope you didn’t forget. I didn’t because Sarah Das reminded us all before we left not to forget to do our taxes! Today was a big day of planning and packing. The only place for breakfast that is open right now is a cafeteria at the airport so we headed over there this morning about 8. Thats where I took this photo-looking out across the snowy airport runway. After a fairly European breakfast of muesli, dried meat and cheese, danishes, Nutella, it was time to go over gear (again!). This time we had...
read moreGreenland!
If you aren’t following me on Instagram, please do! There is a camera icon link to it on the right side of every page. At least today I have been posting a lot of photos-essentially live photo blogging through the day. I won’t be able to do that when in the field, but on the in-between days I can. The blog is also having a hard time uploading photos so the Instagram link is the place to go for photos. So after months (years really from when we first submitted the grant proposal) we are finally in Greenland for the first of two...
read moreGo time!
Right now we are sitting in the C17 awaiting departure. This morning we took the hotel shuttle to the air base but the shuttle could not enter so we had to throw all our gear into the back of a big military police pickup and cram all 6 of us into the cab with the driver. Then we hung around an auditorium for about two hours while the crew “palletized” our luggage. They strap them to pallets and pack the plane as you see behind us. Finally, about 9:45, we took a bus out to the plane and loaded up. The seats are a little...
read more
FOLLOW US ON TWITTER