First ice – in the fog.

Now we are leaving the open seas and venturing into Oden’s natural environment. We cannot see far in the fog, but the ice is here, and the floes are getting more frequent.

There is a sense of relaxation onboard, not only because of us finally going into the ice, but also because the science has been going well for all groups, despite the weather. It was obvious to us that summer was ending in the Chukchi Sea, and the autumn storms were gearing up. There was a big low pressure to the west of us that refused to perform “normally”. The forecasts were quite tricky to Amund, our meteorologist, to make, and the details of the research plans had to be changed more or less constantly to make the most of the “weather windows” as they appeared. Still, in the end, all scientific “work packages” were happy about what was achieved during this first section of Leg 2.

Skidbladner survey in the Chukchi sea. The multibeam echo sounder mounted in the bow is used to map the sea floor. Photo: Magnus Augner

Now, we are all looking forward to more science, and perhaps seeing some polar bears…