SAMS at 78° North: Sea ice sampling on svea

Hi everyone! This time it's Matthew writing.

In the last post, Jamie mentioned the trip to Svea where his snowmobile broke down. The snowmobile has since been towed back to Nybyen where it's patiently awaiting mechanical attention after Easter. Holger and I were actually on the sea ice in Van Miljenfjorden taking cores of the sea ice, plankton samples and CTD readings in the water column that day and Jamie had stopped to say hi before starting the fateful return journey. I'm going to tell you about that trip from my perspective...

First things first, conditions are changing in the Arctic. In all previous years the sea-ice in Van Mijenfjorden by the coal mine at Svea has been well over a metre thick, but this year it was just over the minimum safe thickness of 30cm. It was also wet ice. Slushy snow on slushy ice. Our logistical team checked conditions and confirmed that it was safe to set up our equipment on the fjord. So we headed over.

The logistics team had also seen polar bears, so we were going to have to pay particularly close attention and rotate between polar bear watch and sampling. Arctic research is important and polar bears look cuddly in photos, but neither are worth dying for - so we double checked the rifles, flare guns and binoculars. We shared out safety and lab equipment, packed the sleds, put on extra layers, dressed in snowmobile suits, face masks and helmet and headed out on an adventure.

It was a glorious day. The sun was shining and for most of the Arctic Biology students it was the first serious expedition outside the safety of the local area. We had to cross glaciers and the site was 2 hours drive away, but the conditions were good for snowmobiling. It was relatively flat and there was plenty of snow to keep the hard-working engines of our snowmobiles cool.

We took measurements, ice core samples and set up an oceanographic station to sample the 15m deep water below the ice for analysis back in the lab. Here are a few photos from the trip and a video of the descent into Svea and some of the labwork - maybe you can tell what we were measuring from the equipment?