All is ready for the coast

reinhard setting up the warm corridor between two containers

The last preparations before heading to the coast are ongoing. The PEA team has been very active the last week, even more the last few days and this was highly appreciated by the science team.

The departure is planned for tomorrow early morning. It will take at least 17 hours to cover the 195 km between the PEA and the Roi Baudouin Ice Shelf (RBIS). Christophe, Alain, Reinhard, Nicolas and Lionel will participate to the mission.

The rather big convoy will consist in two snow groomers pulling 4 containers for the scientific equipment, all the facilities to live a nearly normal life during the next 10 days, 6 snow scooters and all the necessary fuel.

The scientific schedule is as follows :

-> 3 or 4 days are planned on the RBIS near the Pinning Point (PP1) to retrieve the strain rate markers and record their new GPS positions since last year, perform low frequency radar measurements on the ice shelf and on the pinning point to improve our knowledge of the bedrock in that area.

-> 50 kms from the RBIS, 3 more days are planned to investigate the Derwael ice rise by performing GPS and radar measurements to better characterise the Raymond bump beneath the ice divide, which will help our understanding of the last deglaciation.

 

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