One afternoon a young adult female polar bear wandered by the ship. She appeared out of the blowing snow and walked past the stern, fairly close to the ship. An hour later she reappeared and approached the ship, walking up the fantail until she was directly below the railing. Scientists and personnel from the ship were pressed at the railing above, and she just seemed to be curious, sniffing the wind and looking back at us, occasionally pawing the broken ice at the ship’s waterline.

This young adult female bear walked past the ship, eventually coming right up to the ship.

The polar bear, standing just below us at the stern of the ship.

The railing of the fantail where folks are standing is about 5 meters, 15 feet, above the ice where the bear was standing, at the aft end of the ship, the fantail. It was a wonderful chance for people to see this bear up close.

The wind finally dropped below 20 knots for a day and we flew for the bear – only to encounter heavy fog that prevented us from finding her. We located another bear that was a lower priority and we successfully captured her, yielding good data. The next day the fog dissipated and we flew for our priority bear again, but she had moved over 30 miles and we could not locate her until we received a satellite transmission at the end of the day. We remained in the area because this bear was one of the two top priority recaptures remaining, and we successfully located her twice, but both times she was traveling in large areas of broken ice which were unsafe for captures. The temperatures remained warm throughout this period, rarely dropping below 25 degrees; the water temperature remained warm as well, and sea ice simply was not forming very fast.

Poor ice near one of our priority bears.

This is a frustrating aspect of field work: success relies heavily on weather, and the bad luck of encountering stretches of poor weather can put an entire field season on hold. The only thing that can be done is planning. We planned a long field season to provide multiple opportunities to recapture each bear, and we planned on capturing secondary target bears as necessary. Thus, even though strong winds and fog really reduced our flight opportunities and poor ice reduced our capture opportunities, we had successful recaptures of target bears and we were able to process new bears as well.

The poor ice conditions we have encountered are remarkable. Air and water temperatures remained very warm throughout October, slowing the formation of new ice as winter begins. The current distribution of sea ice in the Beaufort is much more typical of late summer than early winter – we have not had to break heavy ice at all in the last 10 days. It is inaccurate to state that this warm October has been caused by climate change; climate refers to long-term patterns of average conditions, not day-to-day weather. Even in a world with an enhanced greenhouse gas effect, some autumns will be colder than normal and others will be warmer than normal. However, climate change is changing what is considered “normal.” As the earth’s climate warms, particularly in the Arctic, the type of weather we are experiencing may become common.

Graph from National Snow and Ice Data Center. Extent of sea ice over the entire Arctic is currently low compared to the 1979-2000 average, in fact, it is nearly as low as the same date in 2007, when the extent fell to a record low.

Today we disembarked from the ship, using helicopters to ferry people and luggage back into Barrow. Although the trip ended on a frustrating note, overall, it was a very exciting success. Every piece of data we gathered is unique – almost nothing is known about polar bears during this time of year, particularly bears out here on the pack ice far out at sea. I cannot wait to return to Laramie and receive data from our shore-based capture crew, which recaptured bears on the coast during the last several weeks. Before any in-depth analyses, it will be informative simply to compare data sets from the bears on ice to the bears on the coast, to see if differences are striking.

The gym is below the foc’sle, meaning it is below the main deck very near the bow. The floor in the gym slopes upward; I tried the treadmill for the first time, and decided to do a “hills” run. So, the already-leaning treadmill slowly tilted more then less, repeatedly, every one to two minutes, while I ran in place for 25 minutes. We were breaking moderate ice (probably around a foot thick) so the ship was rocking unpredictably as well, particularly when we encountered pieces of thick multi-year ice (many feet thick). By the time I stepped off the treadmill and tried to walk across the gym I was tilting pretty far myself. I walked slowly, from equipment to equipment, bracing myself as I went.

The gym is located near the bow of the ship; the bulkheads (walls) around the gym are on the outside of the hull, so the sounds of breaking ice can be incredibly loud. Last week I was in the gym when we were breaking very thick multiyear ice, and the sound was like being inside of a thundercloud. I would have had to yell to be heard by someone standing next to me, and the screeching and crunching completely drowned out my ipod. The large white tube in the corner runs from the foc’sle above to a room below the gym. The anchor chain is spooled below, where it is paid out or retrieved by a diesel powerplant up to the deck, where it hangs over the side and is attached to a 9000 lb anchor.

I have participated in other aspects of normal life aboard the ship as well. Last week I caught one of the movies shown nightly in the theatre: about 35 well-padded seats that rocked, as in a real theatre, facing a big-screen television. I got a haircut at the barbershop – there is even a striped pole in the hallway. “Pie in the face” voting took place across the ship for a week, and personnel who received the top 5 votes each took a turn sitting in a chair, surrounded by the crew, one night in the hangar. A vigorous auction took place for the right to be the person to actually sling the pie (gently; no broken noses were allowed). Last night I played bingo in the mess deck after dinner. Around 30 folks show up, once a week, and everyone plays three cards at once.

For most of my downtime I am trying to keep up with the course I am taking this fall (Biochemistry), reading research articles and preparing for an upcoming conference, and otherwise doing what I would be doing at my desk back in Laramie. Unfortunately space is fairly tight on the ship and desks are hard to come by so I do most of this work sitting on my bunk, which is just about 2 inches too small to allow me to sit all the way up.

I cannot view the dispatches myself, but it was passed on that someone asked about our rooms. Our room contains two bunkbeds (“racks”), four closet spaces (mine is visible at the right), and a chair. It is probably around 10 feet by 10 feet. The beds are narrow and long, and they lift for more storage space directly beneath the mattress. A vent in the ceiling delivers fresh air.

Recently, after the two days of transit the ship was hove to in very thick ice near Banks Island, which is in the southwestern corner of the Canadian Arctic Archipelago.

This view from the helicopter shows an area that may show up in a satellite image as mostly-covered with ice, but once we get out there and see it the ice pans are small and separated by open water, making it impossible to capture a bear.

This is the view from the portside main deck this morning, facing south. Thick, multi-year ice from the central Arctic flows south into this area, so the ice conditions are much better for captures. The ridges indicate areas where multiple ice pans have crashed together, and because they are thick pans the broken pieces stack up high where they catch windborne snow.

For captures, we need calm winds, good visibility, thick continuous ice, and a good bear location. Those factors came together to allow us to recapture an adult female we first sampled on May 8th. She was in excellent condition, carrying lots of food reserves in the form of body fat: she had about 6 cm of subcutaneous fat near her rump. All of the sampling went well, but it was slow, partially because of the cold. Temperatures were around 15 degrees (Fahrenheit) during the sampling, which took several hours. It was our first fairly cold day, and a good reminder of the difficulties we may encounter if it gets much colder. Temperatures have continued to drop; as I write, it is 8 degrees with a windchill of -11 degrees.

This 22-month old cub belonged to one the bears we recently recaptured.

This adult female had two 10-month old cubs with her. We waited in the helicopter as the bears walked past, until they got into a good position for a capture.

Because we are so far north, sunrise is already very late – occurring today at 1007am. Because we are so far west, almost to the international date line, sunset is also surprisingly late. I took this photo after 8pm. Daylight is visible through the porthole on a door, but the interior is already lit with overnight red lighting.

Unexpected aspects of life at home also come up. Tonight after dinner, I managed to watch some of the Minnesota Vikings – Green Bay Packers football game (I am from Minnesota). A satellite television signal is received on the ship with the Armed Forces Network, which shows some sports. The reception can be pretty sporadic however, and we lost signal in the 4th quarter. The Vikings were ahead…I hope they won.

I have begun to develop a mental image of the layout of the compartments of the ship (and, thankfully, I can finally find my room without the help of someone nice enough to stop and ask if I am lost). Everything is close here – the mess deck, our berths, our lab space – but connected by a maze of hallways and steep stairs. Walking around outside on the upper decks gives the impression of close-set apartment buildings in a city skyline.

The skyline, viewed standing on a weatherdeck near the bridge facing towards the back of the ship (aft).

Standing over the bridge and looking down on the bow of the ship as we slowly break ice in the evening. The red flag is flown in windy and icy conditions, to judge how the wind may affect the path of the ship and the movement of the ice.

We flew several days in the last week, locating bears for recapture. However most bears were traveling on thin, newly forming sea ice, which is unsafe for capture operations. We really need some colder weather to thicken the ice. Most days have been around 30 degrees (Fahrenheit), although the last two days have periodically dipped down to 21 degrees. Two days ago we finally had our first recapture. We relocated an adult female with her 10 month-old cub as they were traveling on good, thick ice. The capture went well, and we were able to repeat all of the sampling from her first capture, which occurred in May. It was excellent to see this bear again and collect samples that will tell us what she has been doing over the last 5 months. In overall appearance, she and her cub had good body condition. After breaking ice for several days to reach these bears, we will keep the ship in this general area hopefully as colder weather helps expand and solidify the ice pack.

We had a successful capture today as well. This female cub is only 10 months old but already weighs 211 pounds.

It is remarkable that the lack of good, thick ice has been such a problem for us. It was a problem that we considered before this trip but we did not think it would be so common. The ship has a chart of the Arctic that was printed in 1954, and it shows the average location of the ice edge in summer – several hundred miles south of our current position. Until recent years our current position would have been deep into the Arctic ice, rather than near the edge in patchy ice.

Nineteen of these subunits are populations of several hundred to several thousand bears; the 20th subunit is the Arctic basin, the area surrounding the geographic North Pole. Bears have been observed almost all the way north to the pole, but it is unknown if any bears are actually residents there. You can see a map of the subunits at this website: http://pbsg.npolar.no/en/status/population-map.html.

Some of the most well-studied polar bears are in western Hudson Bay, where bears come ashore near Churchill, Canada, during the fall months. Bears in the southern Beaufort Sea are also well-studied – this is the subunit of bears on which we are focusing. It is difficult to study what may be the most mobile mammal on earth; in some areas polar bears have home ranges over 500,000 sq km. Because bears move over such a large area and because they travel on variable sea ice, they are difficult to trap. Instead, finding and darting bears from a low-flying helicopter is the most common capture method.

We are using this helicopter this spring as a platform from which to dart bears. The pilot maneuvers the helicopter low and close to the bear, then a gunner leans out the window on the far side and uses a specialized firearm to shoot a dart into the bear. The dart contains a drug that immobilizes the animal and puts them under anesthesia. Here, the helicopter is parked in front of the lab with covers over the engine and the base of the rotors; space heaters beneath the covers keep critical components warm enough to start in the morning.

We are using this helicopter to aid in spotting bears, and to carry personnel and gear. It is smaller than the darting helicopter. The white tank attached to the belly is an extra fuel tank, giving us an additional 30 minutes or so of flight time.

The sea ice at this time of year is very interesting. Almost the entire Arctic Ocean is frozen over, creating vast ice sheets. Ocean currents and wind push these sheets against each other and they break and crumple into jumbled ridges where they meet. This leaves a totally flat landscape punctuated by randomly-strewn ice chunks, some bigger than houses. It is an otherworldly place to fly over, and to walk through.

This is me crouched in front of some ice blocks near our last capture site, on the sea ice about 30 miles north of the coast of Alaska.

We have been down for weather for several days. After working in Kaktovik last weekend, we used a charter plane to haul all of the USGS gear to Deadhorse. We set up all of their base equipment and got out for a capture on Monday afternoon. It was about 0 degrees (Fahrenheit) and mostly sunny. The weather began to turn that night, steadily becoming warmer, windier, and cloudier. Several inches of snow fell yesterday afternoon as well. All of these factors have reduced visibility to the point where we cannot fly. However, the skies are clearing this afternoon, so we hope to get back out today.

A North Pole without ice?

“Arctic climate is more sensitive than models suggest,” said J.C. Gascard of the Centre National de la Recherche Scientifique, University Pierre et Marie Curie, Paris, France, in his plenary lecture on “The changing arctic ocean-ocean warming and sea ice extent.” Sea ice is seasonal ice that forms on the surface of the ocean in freezing environments and extends out from the more permanent polar ice-caps and frozen landmasses.

Aerial view of Arctic sea ice.

Gascard reported that in 2005 and 2007, the minimum sea-ice extent (which occurs during the summer season when temperatures are warmer) in the Arctic was far lower than had ever been recorded. Moreover, both were far lower than the Intergovernmenal Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) models had predicted. The IPCC is a scientific intergovernmental body established to provide decision-makers with an objective source of information about climate change.

Arctic sea ice at its 2008 minimum extent, on September 10.

Gascard stressed that the dramatic reduction in the summer extent of Arctic sea ice in 2005 and 2007 were not isolated cases, but part of an evolving trend. Gascard and his colleagues have observed a gradual long-term warming, including a longer melting season, over the last 20 years. During this time, the mean sea ice thickness has decreased by 1.3 meters in most of the Arctic Ocean. Gascard warned that Arctic ice is likely to continuing retreating and that “it will disappear during the Arctic summer in this century.” So why does it matter that sea-ice is retreating? The most sensationalized result is loss of polar bear habitat, but they are certainly not alone in their suffering since many polar organisms depend on the sea ice for their survival. Furthermore, if the sea ice continues to melt, the permafrost on land will also melt, changing the entire Arctic ecosystem with global implications. Stay tuned to learn more about the Arctic permafrost.

Arctic sea ice.