What's up doc?

First medical duty on board today… One of my fellow passengers woke up during the night to relieve a most normal physiological function, but in the process of getting back into his berth, had a close and violent encounter between his face and the side of afore mentioned berth. Which was the preamble to me being woken up at 5 by the next of kin to Elephant Man. Luckily, a raid to the freezers allowed me to make a quite convincing icepack (frozen snickers wrapped in kitchen plastic then in a towel), which proved effective for my patient does look quite human again. A slightly beaten up human that is, but no further harm done. O, and for the record: performing minutious care and examination of an injured eye in the constant rolling and swaying of our mini icebreaker: quite the experience, and I'm sure my patient will agree…

Apart from that, life is quite peaceful on board, with its continued routine of eating and sleeping. Since the rolling indeed got gentler, I gave a shower a try this morning (after The Eye, I was quite awake, for once!): felt good, but also extremely reckless, just the kind of thing to break your neck!

A couple of facts about our boat: it's a class A ship, and the smallest icebreaker. 65 by 12.8 meter, it rallies the 2700 km between Hobart and Tasmania five times during the summer season. We are taken care of by an extremely nice crew: they told me this assignment was a pleasure for them, for they often see the same scientists returning from year to year, and it ensures a good working atmosphere: everybody is happy to be here. I'll make sure to enclose pics from life on board as soon as I get back to a connection allowing for this.

A very happy new year to everyone!

Nathalie.

Pitch'n roll!

Nearly 24 hrs on the boat right now, and the captain has commented the situation as "gently rocking". Well, let me tell you: beware of evaluations by seamen... Luckily, I have industrial stocks of The Magic Cocktail, being cinnarizine and dimenhydrate. No fish-feeding for me :-) but a constant impersonation of a substituted junkie. And I'm far from being the only one: we (read the not so sea worthy passengers) sleep for the best part of the day, because of the side effects of the drugs.

The scenery is high sea, so water and waves, and the occasional rainbow. Temperature hasn't dropped noticeably yet, and luckily, there is a great cook on board (French ship, what else…)

Since there is no MD on board for this crossing over, I've also been appointed ship surgeon (as long as everybody keeps sleeping the drugs off rather than trying to part from his/her stomach, it's quite an easy job. So, I've taken quarters in the "hospital", being more a gentrified sick bay.

Passengers on the Astrolabe are mainly French and Italian scientists rejoining different bases around Dumont d'Urville. I'm sending this blog through the satellite link we have: no internet, but the possibility to send and receive mail messages, as long as the size remains manageable. Let's check if this works...

Nathalie.

Arriving in a time wrap

After a thirty-something hours journey, I'm eventually in Hobart. I've had two night flights (Frankfurt-Singapore and Singapore-Melbourne), and somewhere in between, I've lost a day :-)

Actually, I should say we, for I'm lucky to have a travel companion: MACE, who's the proud representative of the 349 Squadron of the Belgian Air Force. He "flies for charity", as himself and his logbook (which will by then be a historical document, no less) will eventually be auctioned. Mace travels around the world, and even made it to LEO (lower earth orbit for the not-so-geeky among our readers) as a companion to our Belgian astronaut, Frank De Winne. And since he (Mace, not Frank of course...) doesn't like to stay at home (being Kleine-Brogel) for too long, he tagged along to what seemed a nice little trip to the far side of the world. So far, he's been cooed over by the crews of the 4 commercial flights we lined up to get here. Captains have dutifully logged the flights and flight attendants found him too cool for school, quite a show. Hope he doesn't get seasick...

'Caus indeed, we have boarded the Astrolabe, the ship from the French Antarctic Task Force and the Institut Polaire Paul-Emile Victor, which travels between Hobart and the French coastal base Dumont-d'Urville. Actually, based on some overly optimistic view, I expected a somewhat, ahem, bigger vessel... If what I've been told about the roughness of southern seas is true, we're in for quite a rollercoaster ride!

So, no work today: wandering in Hobart, to walk off the jetlag in plenty of sunlight (I'll get to the scientific background of this later, for now, the cognitive and physiological effects of the previously cited jetlag get the better part of my CPU power. And briefing on the ship at 18.00. We sail tomorrow...

Nathalie.

BELISSIMA team

BELISSIMA testing equipment

25 November 2010. We are still at the station. There is ample time for testing out the equipment, packing, getting the sleds ready, picking out food etc. About the food: there is plenty of Japanese food around (but only labeled in a Japanese way), and Kenny is the only one who knows what it is and how to prepare it. Needless to say that the radar team will have a lot (and I mean a lot) of Japanese food during the traverse!

The radar testing has been successful. We tried with both 2 and 5 MHz and they were working fine (2 MHz just being longer antennas and distances to cover between transmitter and receiver). Actually, 2 MHz shows much better results (lower signal-to-noise ratio).

There is also a GSSI snow radar that has been tested in the field and is now being mounted in front of a Prinoth. This device will be used for crevasse detection, but we'll use it for shallow layer analysis as well (snow accumulation patterns) along the way across the ice shelf.

We are scheduled to leave tomorrow morning at 7AM. No more news from us for the three coming weeks.

-Frank

BELISSIMA arrival

20 November 2010. The expedition is on and going. With a day delay due to the bad weather conditions between Brussels and London, 6 people of the BELISSIMA and BELARE team could join those that were already present in Cape Town. We were all scheduled to leave on Friday night to Novo (Antarctica). Weather conditions were good and after a short meal and a full day work for the senior scientists busy with paper submissions, reviews, etc. and a day excursion to the Cape for the others, we were all set to fly south. The flight happened without problems, apart from the fact that getting dressed in polar gear with 80 (!) people in a cargo plane is not a sinecure.

Our stay at Novo was limited to a couple of hours – just the time of getting the gear out and sorted on the runway. Due to bad weather at most stations around except for the Belgian station, we could leave almost immediately with the first feeder flight. By 10h30 local time we were at the Belgian Station.

Shear luxury, certainly compared to two years ago. Almost everything is up and running. The frist day being reconnaissance of the area at the base and around, the second day was completely dedicated to testing the equipment. The drilling team started to assemble the ice core drill to test it (and it went to more than a meter of firn already). The radar team first did a GPS survey of the existing stakes around the station (data still need to be worked out) and afterwards started with the testing of the new ice radar. Results were not yet conclusive, but we have good hopes of getting it all up and running in no time. We are scheduled to leave on next Thursday. In the meantime it will be preparation. The whole expedition will be a challenge (again!), but I am sure will get to the right results. This is really great, since we just submitted a paper with the main results of last expedition, just a couple of days ago. Fingers crossed.

Now at the station, we not have all the facilities of our arrival, we also have broadband internet, toilets at work, etc. Too bad that internet brings us back to everyday normal life. It definitely is about time to go into the field and experience the remoteness again.

-Frank

BELISSIMA

Follow the sequel of the first scientific Belgian Antarctic Research Expedition to the Princess Elisabeth Station in Antarctica. This is the BELISSIMA project (BELgium Ice-Sheet /Shelf-Ice Measurements in Antarctica).

From 16 November to 22 December 2010 we'll head south to the vicinity of the new Belgian Antarctic research station to pursue glaciological investigations of the transition between the ice sheet and the ice shelf, the so-called grounding line. This will help us to better understand the current mass balance of the Antarctic ice sheet.

The great depature

We are finally leaving! We are not sure about the ice bears but the penguins are certainly waiting for us :)