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.

Majek called the Polish station and asked them if we can borrow an engine from them. This seems to be no problem at all, just that they can’t come before M/S Horyzont II left for Poland. Unloading of supplies will continue tomorrow after all problems with wind and ice earlier. Then our time for fieldwork will run out because we have to pack and go to the station for the flight back to Longyearbyen. We hope the weather will allow at least some smaller trips in the surroundings – sitting in the cottage is just too boring. Can’t even work with the computer any longer since the time for solar panels at our latitude seems to be over by mid to late August – too low incidence angle of light and increasing darkness at night give only little power to the battery.

Henning Lorenz, Uppsala University