Drilling through the Arctic Ocean

      On Saturday afternoon I drove the weather technician, Edward, out to do his ice and snow surveys since his coworker had just gotten frostbite and was unable to go outside for a week.  It was a beauitful clear day without the slightest breeze, so -31 was feeling quite pleasant.  We jumped in the Environment Canada super duty truck and drove off road down a rocky slope to Parr Inlet.  We had to walk a far ways down to the actual ice since the slope started to get pretty uneven and I was nervous about getting us stuck.   There was about seven inches of snow on top of the ice that Edward first had to shovel off before he got his drilling equipment set up.  Around 20 to 30 minutes later, Edward had manually drilled through nearly 6 feet of ice!  (I can't recall the exact measurement ) The ice will keep getting thicker until sometime in March, and then the temperatures will start to rise a bit during April. 

 

Below is one of the two trucks the main operator and I take to the GAW lab and other various places.  We mainly use this one, "Brown Betty" since the four wheel drive is more reliable then the newer truck, "Big Red".

    
    Once the drilling and measuring was done (and of course, some photos were taken) we hiked back up to the slope, which felt a bit longer going up then it did coming down.  I then followed Edward in the truck as he took snow depth measurements at ten different sites along the way back.  (I swear in my actual job I do more work then just watching others work.) .  As you can see from the photos it is getting pretty light up here in Alert! These were taken around 11 30, which Edward told me was "solar noon hour", when the sun is directly south of us or at its highest elevation and the sky is at it's brightest.  The first sunrise is this coming week!
    
I took a quick video of the ice survey and am trying to upload it but I highly doubt it will work on this limited interet connection.  After loading for an hour and a half I still see no hope of it finishing.

Here comes the sun!

We are no longer living in 24 hours of complete darkness here in Alert!  When I first arrived, the only light in the sky was from the stars and moon if it was a clear day.  If it was clouded over, you couldn't see a thing without artificial light.  I've never tripped while walking so much in my life. Two weeks or so ago, there was just a hint of twilight behind the mountains to the south, which  made that part of the sky a dark blue while the rest remained quite black. Since then the twilight has been getting slightly brighter and longer everyday.  It currently comes in the morning and lasts till mid afternoon. 

The photo above is of the GAW lab and was taken within the first week that I came to Alert.  As you can see, you could not make out any of your surroundings.  The photo is facing south towards some hills that the sun will eventually rise from.  Getting out to the GAW lab three times a week for work is amazing for watching the progress of the sun getting closer to the horizon.  Since the lab is six kilometres south-west of the base, the view of the sky is much less affected from the base's lights.   Below is a picture taken a couple weeks ago at the lab when the first signs of light from the south started to appear.  The sky was spectacular on a clear day! With the twilight to the south and stars shining bright 24 hours a day I could start to see the outline of the hills and the far off mountains surrounding the lab.  I saw a shooting star around 11 am while doing an outdoor filter change the other day.  That was a first.

Now the twilight is making the sky a beautiful light blue to the south, while the rest of the sky remains a very dark blue that still shows the stars.  I took the picture below two days ago while the clouds were clear enough to show how light the twilight has got.  The full moon was also that day, and was on the complete opposite side of the sky, towards the north, where the sky was dark.  It was like having night on one side of the sky and day on the other.  Pictures could not do it justice.

I've been told we are currently in the period of "nautical twilgiht", which is when the centre of the sun is between 6 and 12 degrees below the horizon.  In several days we will be entering "civil twilight" , where the sun is between 0 and 6 degrees below the horizon.  Unfortunately this week has been pretty cloudy which usually blocks the twilight, so the next clear day I'm sure it will be even brighter than the picture below!

The end of the dark period is near! The sun is rising on February 28th  and I am absolutely stoked for Alert's annual sunrise festival with a giant bonfire!  I will be sure to get some great photos from that :)