After five days of hard work and daily hikes onto Longyearbreen, 16 ablation stakes have been installed onto the glacier! Manually drilling into the ice required all hands on deck, especially for the more debris covered sites where the ice was more compressed. These installations will provide primary data for Rebecca and Kirstie's projects, investigating the rate of melt. They are specifically focusing on the influence of debris and localised weather conditions on the glacial ablation. Below is a picture of the drilling in action.
With their results suggesting the occurrence of down wasting and the melt water showing rapid turbulent flow, a lot of dynamic processes appear to be taking place on the surface of the ice.
The resources provided by the University Centre in Svalbard (UNIS) have been invaluable to our projects. Poor weather earlier in the week resulted in research days in the library. The access to specialist research papers on Svalbard have provided a better understanding of the complex scientific research previously undertaken on the archipelago.
In addition to our research data collection, we have celebrated Jack's birthday and continued to explore the local area. Longyearbyen's tourist information centre offer free bike rental, which provided a perfect opportunity for exploration as well as team building exercises. Records are being broken with one team member learning a new life skill in the space of two days.
The field plan for this week involves further data collection, progressing with projects and at least two of the team conducting research on a marine terminating glacier in a different fjord. Fingers crossed for blue skies and safe travels on the Arctic waters.