A completely white day

Drone picture of camp as it looks on a sunny day. From left to right: The red tents are Weatherports (WPs) used for living and storage. WPs have wooden floor, are heated, and can house 2-8 persons each. One WP is the fresh food storage. The small white structure to the left of the Dome is an ice bar made of snow blocks from the trenches. Those are below the two greenish tents, which cover a lift and a staircase. Behind the dome are the generator and fuel tank (not seen). To the right of the dome is a pile of snow to end up in the snow smelter that delivers water for washing. The two large red tents are the carpenters and the mechanics garages used as workshops and for maintenance of vehicles. Structures are spread out in order to avoid drift snow to pile up. The skiway and the load pad for the air planes are further to the left and are not visible in the picture. Finally, the new hill for the satellite receiver, the tower and tent for surface processes analyses, and a couple of weather stations are also not visible.

As it was ‘Sunday’ today, we started a bit later than usual.

Activities for preparation of flight missions over the weekend continued.

Most of the day it has been overcast and completely white with no or very limited contrast. It has been snowing quite a bit and the wind direction turned almost perpendicular the skiway: most unfavourable for flight missions. We hope for improvement so we can receive air planes over the coming days.

What we have done today:

1.    Finished packing at Swiss drill test site
2.    Resampled snow surface profile in the clean snow area
3.    Finished trimming the inclined trench
4.    Prepared for building floor in drill trench
5.    Packed and documented ice core boxes
6.    Measured open snow surface roughness

Weather today: Overcast with a few sunny spells in the morning. Clouds are low sometimes turning into ground fog. Some snowfall during the late afternoon. Temp. -14 °C last night increasing to -4 °C in the late morning, dropping to -9 °C late evening. Wind 4-12 kt starting from SE and turning NW. Horizon definition: Poor-Nil. Surface definition: Fair-Poor.

FL, Anders Svensson