Antarctica | Ice Stories: Dispatches From Polar Scientists

Glaciers and the Simple Life in Antarctica’s Dry Valleys

By Mary Miller · March 30, 2009 ·

TAYLOR VALLEY, DRY VALLEYS, ANTARCTICA-- In this interview from in front of the Canada Glacier in Antarctica’s Taylor Valley, Hassan Basagic from Portland State University describes the essential role of polar glaciers in supporting the bare-bones ecosystems in the Dry Valleys... {Read More »}

The Last Task of the Season

By Jean Pennycook · February 18, 2009 ·

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CAPE ROYDS, ROSS ISLAND, ANTARCTICA-- The Adélie Penguin breeding season in Antarctica is short. By late January it is time for everyone to leave including the penguins. Before our team departs our last task is to band the chicks... {Read More »}

The Molt Is On

By Jean Pennycook · February 17, 2009 ·

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CAPE ROYDS, ROSS ISLAND, ANTARCTICA-- Penguin chicks are born with a fine cover of small soft feathers. In a few days they will loose those feathers and grow wooly thick gray ones. These feathers will keep them warm for the next few weeks, but are not waterproof... {Read More »}

A Tale of Two Cities

By David Ainley · February 10, 2009 ·

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ROSS ISLAND, ANTARCTICA-- In this land (Antarctica) and an ocean far away (to most of you), but not long ago (in the past weeks or so), a scenario was played out that in days long past may once have happened, in fact, near by to where you are, but involving penguin cousins... {Read More »}

The Stuck Drill Story

By Zoe Courville · February 6, 2009 ·

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RECOVERY LAKES, ANTARCTICA-- Leaving site 5! Today we are finally on the move again, after a prolonged stay at our science stop at site 5 in the middle of the Recovery Lakes area. We were delayed after our ice core drill was stuck 90m down in the hole Lou was drilling... {Read More »}

Mapping East Antarctica’s Uncharted Territory

By Mary Miller · February 6, 2009 ·

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WILLIAMS FIELD, NEAR MCMURDO STATION, ANTARCTICA-- East Antarctica contains nearly all the world's supply of fresh water and could contribute hundreds of feet of sea level rise, yet little is known about the stability of this vast ice sheet... {Read More »}

Out of AGAP

By Adrienne Block · February 4, 2009 ·

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MCMURDO STATION, ANTARCTICA-- The problem with going to remote places is that no one wants to come pick you up... {Read More »}

Devil Snow

By Zoe Courville · February 4, 2009 ·

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RECOVERY LAKES, ANTARCTICA-- We've spent the last 3 weeks, the majority of our science days, in a region known as Recovery Lakes, or the Lake District as we affectionately call it. This system of several lakes, recently discovered, are subglacial-- that is, they are below... {Read More »}

Pits

By Zoe Courville · February 2, 2009 ·

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RECOVERY LAKES, ANTARCTICA-- The last month has been a blur of flying snow from my shovel and endless white vistas seen from the windscreen of Jack, the finicky TL6 Berco I take turns driving. Even now, as Ole, our traverse doctor, drives Jack, I am typing in the back seat... {Read More »}

Our Series of Unfortunate Events

By Adrienne Block · January 30, 2009 ·

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AGAP-SOUTH CAMP, ANTARCTICA– On January 6th, we sat around after dinner discussing how miraculous it was that nothing had gone wrong. This clearly was the cosmic queue for everything to go wrong in the next 27 hours... {Read More »}

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