Saturday turned out to be a beautiful, sunny Arctic September day! We had enough time for a short ice station and stopped at an ice floe for a couple of hours. In the evening we returned to the ice floe to retrieve the buoy. When the equipment was safe on board again we could start the journey back to Longyearbyen.
There was a lot of activity on the sea ice yesterday. A big part of the scientific scope of this expedition is to study the physical and mechanical properties of sea ice and icebergs. The different research teams were busy studying ice ridges, measuring ice friction and turbulence, performing borehole jack tests and so on.
Oh, and we had a visitor this morning. We have basically been still during the night and early in the morning a passing polar bear decided it wanted to check out the icebreaker. It was hanging out nearby for a while, waiting for something interesting to happen, but left as soon as we started moving again after breakfast.
Yesterday we started seeing somewhat thicker ice and even some icebergs. Oden pulled up right next to one of the bigger icebergs. Researchers from UNIS decided it was a good opportunity to laser scan the iceberg and quickly had to set up their equipment on deck. With the laser scanner it's possible to create a 3D point cloud overview of the part above the water surface and estimate the iceberg's size and shape.
We arrived at the second mooring deployment site around breakfast time this morning. The deployment went well and we are now on our way to the third mooring site - about 60 nautical miles to the northeast.
Around 01.00 in the morning we entered the ice for the first time on this expedition. At the moment it's mostly random ice sheets in various sizes that are drifting by. We're still on our way to the first mooring line deployment site and our estimated arrivaltime is around 17.00.
The Oden Arctic Technology Research Cruise left Longyearbyen, Svalbard, yesterday evening. At the moment we're heading west towards the east coast of Greenland, where we will deploy four IPS/ADCP mooring lines. Then we're going into the ice.
This is the last report from NOA-Svalbard and the participants want to thank everybody and all organizations who contributed to the success of this expedition. And thank you for following us during the last month!
Shortly after we arrived to the Polish station two days ago we got the message that our helicopter flight to two inland localities and then back to Longyearbyen was adjourned to Friday.
Half past eleven last night our two saviours from the Polish station arrived at Hyttevika. After a small party we went to bed and got up early in the morning. They had to go to Werenskioldbreen and get data from a couple of data loggers, we had to get ready for leaving Hyttevika.
Good weather in the morning, worse during the day and better again in the evening. Waiting for the 21.00 communication with the Polish station and their plans.
Yesterday, in the early evening, the polar bear came back. Three of us were enjoying a nap while I thought that there was something around the house which is more than the wind.
At half past seven in the morning the four from Werenhus arrived at Hyttevika. They were on their way to the Polish station to board M/S Horyzont II for the trip back to Poland.
Not much new today. Bad visibility because of low clouds and wet. Better around noon, but our trip to Vimsodden and Skoddebukta is cancelled since all the sand in the outboard engine blocks now the switching of gears. And we can't fix it, although we tried.
Today we left Hyttevika at noon when the weather looked fine. The rain started again 10 minutes later... But only for 30 minutes.
The weather report promised 11 m/s wind from the south/southeast and somehow my sleep was uneasy. Around six in the morning the first wind gust shook the cottage and got me out of the sleeping bag.
Vi har de senaste dagarna rört oss söderut och vi befinner oss nu på 87°N i Amundsenbassängen.
In the morning we tried the outboard engine – some heavy pulling to get it started and the engine worked on all three cylinders.
A good night's sleep. The wind is down. We checked the outboard engine and the obvious damages are the hood, a broken cover in the engine (including the cast aluminum bolts), an electrical connection, two pipes and the fixation of the pressure sensor for the fuel injection system – and sand, sand, sand everywhere.
I woke up about half past six when a board from the bed above mine fell down on me while the hut was shaking in the wind gusts. A minute later Majek shouted his alarm – the Zodiac was moving again.
