Frozen lake expedition

-
Frozen Lake Kilpisjärvi and Mount Saana

In the morning we meet our IGB colleague Georgiy and his team consting of two Russians from Irkutsk: Konstantin and Ilja and Joonathan from Finland. They are all lake physicists interested in the dynamics of the water under the ice.


Today's task is to install some devices on the ice of Lake Kilpisjärvi. The lake is frozen with ice thickness about 50 cm at the moment. I am allowed to join the other physicists to go on the lake. First task is to fit the warm and safe winter working suit, then we take the snowmobile and I take a seat in the sledge where we can store equipment. It is a bumpy ride with two Siberians and a Kasach......

Winter working suit

Dashing through the snow....

Our team disappearing in the snowy desert

First job is finding the place for the installations. Yesterday a hole was drilled through the ice and we are supposed to drop some underwater measurement devices there. However it was snowing and storming all night and its not an easy task. It is somehow spooky when you here someone with a Russian accent yelling "We cant find hole" while you stand on the ice several km away from shore....well simply drill a new hole then. You drill 4 wholes as corners of a square with a hand drill, use a martialic looking saw to cut beween the holes and then use sort of pliers to pull the core out. Finally you can drop your measurement devices and say "do swidanya (good bye)" as the hole will freeze, the device will measure automatically, lo the data and you need to wait until the ice thaws to recover it....that means in June up here :D

Our lab for today

Drill small hole

...done

Connect the 4 holes to make one large square...
Devicce to measure particle flow

I was thinking of placing an SQM (a light measuring device) somewhere out here....however in this ice desert there is nothing to mount it. Well nothing to mount it? No there is the ice core serving as a landmark in te icy desert. I grab my big expensive high quality cable ties and want to mount the SQM. "Snap" frist cable tie broken, "snap" second cable tie broken.....The Russian (Siberian) lake physicist lough "this cable tie nje rabotajet (not working), too cold...its rubbish". Hmmm...another lesson learned.

What to do next? Well we have the ice saw and I use it to cut a step into the ice pillar, then use cheap Chinese cable ties (they last...) and finally use lake water (that will freeze immediately) to align the ice SQM towards the zenith. 
Precision engineering?....

..or is it ice sculpturing?

First SQM on frozen lake?

I will probably not win an ice sculputuring competition but I guess it is the first SQM installed on a frozen lake (see paper about SQM on Lake Stechlin a dark site in Germany here).

Then it goes back to shore for a well deserved dinner...

Kommentare

Kommentar veröffentlichen

Beliebte Posts aus diesem Blog

UFO in Kilpisjärvi part 2 - light pillars and ice road runner

-
Bild
It was fun being in the snowy desert during day - but our misssion is to measure light at night. After dinner Franz and I hit the road...we earn confused looks from our lake physics friends..."You want to get out now? Not go to sauna after this busy and cold day?" - Aaargh thanks for the reminder ;) When outside, we are amazed by the view above Kilpisjärvi village. The ice fog creates "light pillars" a phenomenon where flat ice crystals float in the lower atmosphere and create some sort of giant mirror reflecting only the light emitted directly upwards towards your observation point (see wikipedia here and nicer pictures on twitter ). These pillars look bizarrely and the most spectacular thing is that every car approaching us is creating the same moving "light pillar"....pretty stunning. During our hunt for darkness we measure night sky brightness values down to 21.5-21.6 mags (so near natural). Every now and then ice-fog or clouds appear and ...
Mehr anzeigen

Last day in Kilpisjärvi

-
Bild
The Kilpisjärvi biological station in winter is a nice place for a stay. It is not busy at all, but still you meet some other researchers to discuss new ideas. It is well equipped (with stuff like sleighs, snow shoes and ski) and has an own cantine that serves breakfast and dinner. We had nice food here including the very local reindeer meat dish. The station at foot of mount Saana Stuff arctic researchers need The station is famous for the research on lemmings. They are part of the logo, you can read an article in the hallway and look at (touch?) some lemming fur. Logo of the biological station Lemmings on Nature cover Lemmings on poster On the last day in Kilpisjärvi we don't have to drill holes anymore. We can inspect data, take down our installed measurement devices and start to pack. We watch our lake physicist friends unpack their ROV ( remotely operated underwater vehicle ) a nice device that is built to skate (!) just under the ice taking measu...
Mehr anzeigen

A super dark spot in Latvia

-
Bild
This time I follow a recommendation by Oliver Lindecke a PhD student from the Leibniz Institute for Zoo and Wildlife Research in Berlin. He is working (among other stuff) on effects of artificial light on bats ( recent paper here ). Oli studies bats in Pape Village in Latvia and he told me that the bat research station is in a very dark spot. Checking the world atlas data shows that indeed across the Courland peninsula many sites are almost free of light pollution . So I pack an SQM, the camera with fisheye and fly to Riga. The plan is to go around the peninsula in the first night, do some measurements at the Northern tip, record night sky brightness wit an SQM roadrunner system along the travel and meet up with the bat researchers in the morning. Its a long drive from Riga and I arrive at Kolka Village at the northern tip just after sunset. Due to some technical problems I have to improvise and run the SQM and GPS with separate programs. But it finally works and the ...
Mehr anzeigen