Polar Passport

"Cool" Classroom Chat

Wow! Dan was just here with us at Questacon, involved in an online chat with a whole class of Year 6 students from a State School in Brisbane, Queensland.

The class was the same one that was asking questions via comments on the blog, and Monica, their teacher arranged the chat for now, while Dan is back in Canberra.

We're really keen to hear back from the school about what the kids thought of the opportunity, and what they talked about after the chat. Dan had sent Monica some photos to help move along the discussion. One of them is very funny!

We captured the chat - here it is!

Dan> Good morning.

Monica> Hi Dan, Sorry we're late. The kids were a vit late getting back from sport

Dan> We're all ready at this end now too.

Veronica> Hi Dan

Emma> Hi Dan

Dan> 'morning class. How was sport?

Brendon> hey dan

Veronica> It was fun!

Emma> Fun! We did highjump!

Kirsty> fun

Courtney> it was fun

Dan> wow, there's a lot of you in the room now. Who's got the first question?

Veronica> What did you study over in Antarctica?

Emma> How many year did you have to study until you could go to Antartica

Dan> I did my first trip to Antarctica after three years at university.

Dan> I did a project there, and wrote a report about it to finish the last year of my science degree.

Erin> how many trips have u done

Justin> hi Dan

Dan> I've studied a lot of different things on my trips to Antarctica, but always some sort of geology.

Dan> I've done nine summers as a scientist, and I've also been a few times working on tourist ships.

Brendon> Have you discovered any new species of anything?

Ellie> has it been a great experience

Dan> I don't think I've seen any new species. In Antarctica, there are lots and lots of animals, but not many different species.

Dan> It's always been a great experience. Even though I've been a lot of times, it's always exciting.

Courtney> what is the lowest temperiture youve had so far?

Justin> Have you seen whales

Monica->

Dan> I think the coldest was about -30°C. But the wind was also blowing then, so it felt a lot colder. We didn't work outside much; mostly we stayed in the tent.

Natalie> have you been to the Arctic before?

Shane> Have you had any frost bites

Dan> Yes, we usually see whales from the ship, on the way to and from Antarctica. Mostly Humpback and Minke whales, but sometimes also Fin whales, which are really big ones.

Dan> Yes, I also work in the arctic sometimes. I'll be going there in July and August this year.

Justin> wow

Dan> I'll go to Svalbard to work on a sailing ship, and to Greenland to do some science work. I'll be in a place called Narsarsuaq. Maybe you can find it on the map.

Shane> Is that really fashion over there

Tayla> hi

Dan> That picture is on the icebreaker, Aurora Australis, before we left Hobart.

Justin> what did you do when you were stuck in a tent.

Ellie> wow and hi dan

Dan> We had to practice using the lifeboats and survival suits, in case there was an accident.

Monica->

Dan> Luckily, that was the only time we had to do it!

Monica> More spectacular Dan fashion

Courtney> has there been an accident so far?

Damian> That it looks funny.

Erin> what has been the longest time you have spent in a tent?

Dan> This one is of King Neptune. On a ship, when you cross the equator, or the Antarctic Circle, he comes on board to initiate people who've never done it before.

Dan> Usually that means getting a bit dirty... kissing a fish, and having vegemite smeared on your face!

Dan> Luckily I have been before, so I didn't have to do it this time.

Tayla> how long did it take to travel from antarctica to australia ?

Taryn> hi

Damian> Did the fish turn into a prince

Sean> are you looking fored to the artic

Dan> This time, it took 12 days to get there. But it took more than three weeks to get back, because we visited two other stations on the way.

Dan> The fish didn't turn in to a prince... maybe because we didn't have a princess on board to kiss it!

Dan> Am I looking forward to the arctic? YES! I love travelling to wild places. And I've never been to Greenland before, so that will be all new and exciting.

Vanessa> i would just love to go to the places that you go to

Sean> iwould love to go to antartica

Dan> Well, there are a lot of ways to get there. You can work there, as a scientist or a mechanic, or a chef, or almost anything.

Damian> have you seen a polar bear in the wild before

Dan> If you decide that you want to go, I'm sure you will think of a way to do it.

Vanessa> my mum would just love to here about all of this i will tell her straight after scholl

Monica->

Dan> Yes, in the arctic we often see bears. It's best to see them from the ship, because that's safer. But I carry a gun when we go walking on land, just in case. I've never had to use it yet.

Matthew> do u like goin to cold laces or warm places?

Taryn> i would love to go to antarctic and see the animals

Cody> hi dan how it gowing

Gemma> What birds do you see in the Antarctic.

Michael> hi Dan

Sean> i like playing in the snow

Dan> I like wild places, hot and cold. Ihave also worked in Papua New Guinea... also wonderful!

Monica> I've just shown them the photos of the camp toilet Dan.

(is that an Antarctic long-drop? Geoff)

Sean> was png a great place?

Dan> Where did you play in the snow, Sean? I wasn't sure how many of you Queensland kids would have seen it before.

Emily> is it cold to sit on the toilet

Christen> when you are going to the toilet has anyone ever seen you?

Sean> in new zealand and tasmania

Vanessa> it must be weird, how did it fell going in that thing or did you get the hang of it

Tayla>

Dan> Yes, it's cold to go to the toilet! So you don't waste any time there.

Dan> There's usually not any people to see you, but once I had ten penguins standing watching me!

Christen> I saw the snow in new zealand

Monica->

Vanessa> how funny

Gemma> Hey Dan, have you ever been to Alaska? It's awsome!

Maddisyn> Hey Dan

Tayla> what do you do in ur own time

Emily R.> I been to the snow in NZ and I went skiing

Matthew> :}whats with the mr potatohead?

Michael> how was xmas

Dan> This was our Christmas tree. There were just five of us in a little hut, 500 km from the nearest people.

Emily> how long do you stay in antartica

Aaron> what did you get for christmans

Josh N> what equiptment did you use?

Sean> wow

Vanessa> it doesn't look like a big one

Dan> I got some books, and some chocolate.

Cody> cool

Aaron> what where the books about

Maddisyn> COOL

Dan> This time I was away for about four months, with about three months in Antarctica.

Vanessa> i will read about antartica and maybe it will convince me to go

Dan> My longest trip was four and a half months, and my shortest just one month.

Cody> the news paper muster been good there

Aaron> do you like travelling in big ships?

Dan> We did get a newspaper every day from Australia, by email.

Dan> Only when we were at the base, of course! Not in the tent.

Gemma> How long do you plan to stay in the Arctic for?

Bronte> what do you plan on studying in the artic

Emily> whats the difference between the artic and antartic

Monica->

Dan> Small ships are better than big ships! I like working on sailing ships best - I'll put some pictures on the blog when I'm in the arctic.

Aaron> what do you do for fun up there?

Dan> I'll be working in Greenland for about three weeks. We'll be measuring sea-level change, which tells us how the glaciers on Greenland are changing.

Sean> bye dan got to go

Dan> Differences between artcic and antarctic: Antarctica is colder, and has penguins. The arctic has less land (more sea), and bears but no penguins. There are whales and seals at both poles.

Monica> Is that something to do with global warming?

Tayla> thanks for ur time, bye

Monica> Lunch bell has gone dan. We have to lunch

Gemma> Thanks for going online and chatting to us Dan.

Cody> thanks or your time bye

Emma> Thanks for your time is been great to have a chat!! Lunch Time gotta go!

Emily R.> thanks for coming and chatting to us, bye

Aaron> bye dan and thanks

Emily> thankyou for your time. bye!

Maddisyn> Thanks heeps Dan 4 all the information about your stay in antarctica

Dan> Well, it is related. But because I'm a geologist, I usually study changes that happened thousands of years ago. But that all helps us understand what the glaciers will do as the earth gets warmer.

Christen> thanks for all the time you've spent answering questions Dan,bye

Josh N> thanks for the time typeing to us all

Dan> It was fun talking to you!

Michael> thanks a lot dan it was cool.

James> thanks dan for your time

Dan> If you have more questions, you can still send them to the blog. I'll be writing more in the next few days.

Bronte> thak you dan for you time

Monica> Thanks so much Dan. They've all gone to lunch.

Dan> I'll try to also write the blog from the arctic, so keep watching it!

Dan> What a rush! that went very fast.

Monica> It's quite a task managing 30 kids on a chat at the same time. But they did enjoy it. The room was very noisy. Good noisy.

On Board Aurora Australis

Since leaving Davis more than a week ago we've settled into the rhythm of shipboard life again. The food is excellent (and there's too much of it), so most people are using the small gym to work off some energy and justify eating three meals a day. Between meals, people occupy themselves with work (almost everybody has a laptop computer), reading, writing, Scrabble, card games, movies, and guitar practise.

We're moving across time zones and have changed our clocks a couple of times already, so unless you make an effort to keep to a timetable it's easy to confuse your body clock. At almost any hour of the day or night you can find someone in the mess (that's the name for the restaurant on a ship) making tea and a snack, and reading through the bulletins of news from the outside world which are distributed every day.

There are a lot of stops on this trip home. First, we spent a day about 100 km south of Davis with the ship parked up against an iceberg while the three helicopters worked non-stop for four hours flying drums of fuel to the shore. There were 264 drums to move, and the Squirrel helicopters can carry 3 at a time, so there were a lot of trips. The fuel will be used next year for an IPY science project studying the Gamburtsev Subglacial Mountains - a huge mountain range in the middle of Antarctica that is completely buried by ice. The fuel will be used for aircraft fitted with gravity meters, magnetometers and ice radars that will look "through" the ice to reveal the mountains beneath.

Two days later we were at Mawson Station, Australia's first base in Antarctica. We had a lot of cargo to deliver there, but this year the fast ice around the station never broke away, so we had to stop at the edge of the ice, about 13 km away.

The ice didn't only affect us: it's also very important for the Adelie penguins that live close to Mawson. After their chicks hatch, the parents are busy making trips to the sea to collect food. When the ice doesn't break out, the trip is much longer, so they can't bring back as much food, and more of the chicks die. This year, about 2000 chicks hatched, but they all died. That's sad, but it happens every few years at almost all penguin rookeries. They are living in an extreme environment, and even a small change in ice conditions or food supply can mean the difference between life and death.

Because of the ice, all the cargo to and from Mawson was moved by the helicopters again. It was cold work for some of us on the ship, moving crates and boxes from the shipping containers on the foredeck to the helideck at the stern of the ship. But although the air was cold, the view was magnificent!

To the south, across the frozen sea, we could see the rocky peninsula where Mawson station is built, and clearly see the two tall wind turbines they use to generate electricity. Behind the station the ice sheet rises into the distance, and several jagged mountain ranges poke up through the ice - the ones I saw on the way from Davis to Enderby Land in January.

Beside us, at the ice edge, Emperor penguins gathered to swim in the wash of the propellor behind the ship. Sometimes they would slip out of the water and stand around on the ice - watching us while we watched them. As winter sets in and we head back north, the Emperor penguins will be returning to their colonies to start breeding, and brooding their eggs through the middle of winter.

Icebergs lined our northern horizon, and on calm days there would be a mirage, so they seemed to be floating up in the sky. You don't only get mirages in hot places - what you need is air of different temperatures. Here, most of the air was around -10°C, but there was a 'warm' layer at about -2°C just above the water, which bent the light rays back up and made the mirage.

Leaving Mawson a couple of days ago, we sailed across a large polynya, which is a region where thick sea ice never forms, because winds or currents keep moving it away.

After a few calm cold days, the sea was covered by a thin skin of new ice a few centimetres thick. I was odd to see the skua gulls sitting and walking on the surface of the sea, instead of swimming in it. The ship ploughs through unaffected, scattering spray and ice fragments away from the bow, which skitter and glide across the thin ice until the bow wave catches up and overwhelms them. The evening was clear and the sunset golden, so the ship's bridge was packed as we left the open water of the polynya and re-entered the pack ice. As we went to sleep that night the ship was weaving and shuddering as we forced a way through.

The last two days we've been steaming eastwards in open water, making good time towards Casey. We expect to arrive there on Thursday. In the meantime, there are always a few icebergs to look at, and often seabirds and whales too. So when I've had enough of books, movies, games and work I can always go and admire the view.

Heading east,

Dan

A Lunar Eclipse

Saturday night is always a bit special at Davis - the chef makes a special meal, we lay the tables with tablecloths, cutlery and glasses, and cover the windows to darken the dining room. Candles are lit, people dress neatly, and there's a sense of occasion.

Last night was extra special - it is probably the last Saturday night before the ship arrives to take us home. So the meal was extraordinary, and there were a few speeches recognising the work accomplished by those of us who came just for the summer, and the challenges ahead for the smaller group staying on for the whole winter. That sounds a bit too serious - it was mainly great fun, a celebration of the nice station community we have become over the past months.

After the lavish dinner (I think we will be eating leftovers for a week!), the station band played in the lounge and the party got steadily louder. When it got too loud for me I left, and when the heavy insulated door clunked shut behind me, the night's entertainment really started to get good.

After a calm sunny day and a glowing sunset, the night was gorgeous: calm, clear and cold, -8°C already as I left the building, and getting colder. In the west, the constellation of Orion, lying on his side, was setting over the horizon where distant icebergs lay in the moonlight. In the east Scorpio was already clear, and the Southern Cross was almost directly overhead. The full Moon made the sky too bright to see all the stars, but the scatter of the Milky Way was a clear band.

I knew that there would be an eclipse of the Moon later in the night, so I set my alarm clock and got a couple of hours sleep. At 3:00 am I took my sleeping bag and walked a short distance to the edge of the station, where I had a view over the bay.

The eclipse started at 3:18, but the first stage (the penumbral phase, when the Moon is in half-shadow) was barely noticeable. Even without that, it was wonderful to be there: although it was the middle of the night, elephant seals were bellowing and scrapping on the beach, and somewhere on the rocks below me there was a group of moulting penguins who gave an occasional squawk in the darkness. By now Orion had set, and his dog, with Sirius, the brightest star in the sky as his eye, was running full tilt at the horizon. Between Sirius and the Moon, a band of pale green aurora waved for a few minutes and faded away again.

I dozed off in my sleeping bag, but at 4:30 my alarm peeped to announce the next phase of the eclipse, when the Moon enters the umbra, or full shadow of the Earth. The dark circle spread across the face of the Moon, and as the sunlit area of moon got smaller over the next hour, the dimming was obvious - the reflection in the rippling waters of the bay below me vanished, and the Moon's shadowed area showed a red glow, caused by sunlight refracting through the Earth's atmosphere.

Eventually the entire face of the Moon was in shadow, which is normally the best time to see the red glow, but at Davis it was now almost dawn. The sky was getting lighter as the Sun approached behind me, and as the eclipsed Moon sank towards the row of icebergs on the horizon it simply faded into the background and vanished. I'll be watching this evening to see it rise again, now slightly smaller than full and beginning to wane.

With the eclipse over, I watched the dawn light turn the icebergs from distant white shapes into crisp three dimensional forms. The first rays of the Sun cast shadows from the icy cliffs and crenellations, and made the rocky hills and islands glow orange. I emerged from my sleeping bag and returned to my warm bed for a few hours more sleep.

Isn't our solar system a great place to live?!

Dan

New Year at Davis

After one week working at the Bunger Hills, we arrived back at Davis Station on December 31, at 5 pm. The most important thing to do when we arrived was to have a shower! Then dinner - we had good food at the Bunger Hills, but it's nice when someone else cooks for you, and here at the Station there is a professional chef. And after dinner, the New Year's Eve party!

There were about 50 people at Davis Station that evening, and everyone was in the lounge room to celebrate. Because it is light outside 24 hours/day, they cover the windows to make it darker inside - a better party atmosphere. Outside, the Sun was shining on the icebergs just a few kilometres from the shore, but inside the Station band was playing, and at midnight we sang Auld Lang Syne, drank a toast, and carried on with the party, just like everywhere else in the world!

On January 2 and 3, we had strong winds, which blew away a lot of the sea ice in front of the station, so now we have open water beside us, with a few penguins and seals swimming in it. Maybe you can see that on the Davis Webcam.

Tomorrow, Nick and I will fly about 1000 km west of here, to work for a few days at Mt Riiser-Larsen. Like at Bunger Hills, we'll install a GPS receiver there.

Happy 2007!

Dan

Ice in the sea

The last few days have been very exciting: the sea is full of ice!

South of 60 degrees latitude, the winds are weaker and the waves smaller, so our ride is much more comfortable. First, we started passing more and more icebergs, of all shapes and sizes. Some are like castles, others have beautiful curves, because they have rolled upside down and we can see the parts worn smooth by the sea. The biggest ones are flat on top, with cliffs about 20 m high. They are big chunks that have broken off floating glaciers around the coast of Antarctica.

The icebergs look enormous, but it's amazing to think that most of an iceberg is underneath the water: these ones are 100 or 200 m deep. We saw several big ones, around 2 km long, but they are dwarfed by the one I can see out my cabin window right now: it is 80 km long and 30 km wide! It stretches to the horizon, and is big enough to see in the satellite pictures we use to check the weather conditions (NOAA image, courtesy BoM and AAD).

As well as icebergs, there is a lot of sea ice. This forms every winter, when the sea freezes. In the summer, it breaks up into big flat pieces called 'floes', which drift around, and eventually melt. Where we are now, the floes are large, about 100 m across, and cover the ocean as far as we can see in all directions, with only small gaps of water in between.

The ice is really beautiful, but quite difficult for the ship to travel through: we twist and turn to follow the water leads between the ice floes, but sometimes we have to break through them too. The ship bangs and shakes when we hit a big piece, and the front of the ship pushes up on top of the ice. The weight of the ship cracks the ice, and we push through.

The best place to be when we are icebreaking is right on the front of the ship, where you can feel the shaking and hear the crashing of the ice, but if you want to stay warm, it's almost as good to be inside on the ship's bridge, with big windows looking in all directions.

It's got a bit colder: the air temperature is now about -2°C. The Sun is shining and there's only a light breeze, so it's quite comfortable.

The sea is also colder: it's now -1.5°C. Fresh water freezes at zero degrees, but because the sea is salty, it can get colder, and freezes at about -1.8°C. We've also been seeing some real antarctic animals in the ice: small black-and-white Adelie penguins, larger Emperor penguins, lots of crabeater seals, and a couple of whales, as well as several types of birds flying around the ship: various petrels, fulmars and skuas.

We're only about 200 km from Davis Station now, and will probably be close enough tomorrow to fly there by helicopter. Yesterday, we checked all our clothes and bags to make sure we aren't taking any foreign plants that might grow in Antarctica. It's not likely, but it's good to make sure, so we vacuum cleaned our bags, pockets and shoes.

Next blog entry will be from Davis Station, or maybe out in a field camp!

Almost there,

Dan