one last tendril of the cryosphere unfurled over Washington today, leaving nearly the entire landscape ski-able. I got out just in time to be able to hop from place to place, mostly avoiding those short painful patches where skis chalkboard-scraped over well-shoveled salt flats. All seemed quiet between the Newark Gardens and the National Cathedral. Long sidewalks shoveled too soon or too late had a perfect compact layer of snowice for picking up speed. Through short stretches of trail behind my house -- for maybe half a mile, and back, and back again -- I felt like I was on a real cross country ski trail. Can't believe I can't do this three times a week through the entire winter. The moon and Homeland lights lit up the forest but for the darkest of trees and the dead black stream. Urban skiing has a certain appeal. Kind of a lawlessness like paddling through flooded forests normally well away from the channels of Breakneck Creek. And like canoeing through the downtown of a small town, it changes the whole point of view.

South of the Equator

Oct. 25

Santiago de Chile

Hola amigos.  Que mas?  I know it's been a long time since I rapped at ya, but I've been busy working, traveling, and just generally not blogging.  There have been many near-blogs with vaguely aquatic themes, like extensive coverage of our Mediterranean cruise with Enrique and Luz Helena, some revitalizing paddles down the Cuyahoga with Karl, Lee, David, Griffin, Emily, Nate, and Moni (on her first Crooked River adventure!) some random thoughts about Hurricane Irene hitting D.C., and stretching the connection even further, a baseball game with Boller that featured a heavy mist, but alas they've probably all been lost to the erosion of memory.

But now I'm off on another Operation IceBridge mission to the Antarctic, and so I'll give it another go.  I've made it most of the way down and it's hard to believe I'm actually in better shape than when I was heading to Greenland, because I'm pretty darn shaky.  Well, it's either me or we've been experiencing a steady 4.0 magnitude quake for the last two hours straight.

Just had a cafê cortado and two medialunas though, so feeling a bit better.

bringing the beard back home

Apr. 19th
Washington

Back in D.C. for a few days ... and then off for a Mediterranean cruise.  I know, I know.  Kind of a ridiculous month.  Just a few photos for closure.

Last night of photography on ice.  What is that in the sky?

Air Greenland, I love you just for your beverages.

Sea ice near Iceland

The Copenhagian cappuccino was not as good as I remembered -- it was even better.

sweet, sweet D.C. spring.

And finally, a beard in the office.  For a few days anyway.

field trip

Apr. 15
Kangerlussuaq

Lowest temperature of trip:  -22 F
Lowest high of trip:  1 F
Highest temp of trip:  18 F

Auroras seen:  5

      are you all clicking on the photos?  at least when it moves you?  because this one, for example, looks even better when you can see those stars.

This has been one of the hardest few weeks of my life, which makes me wonder how honest this blog has been.  Did that come through?  Should I have written something that was more raw, that didn't care if a the haters got access to it?  A couple google searches doesn't bring it up.  Unless I search for 'aquateer' in which case it comes in at #7.  I guess that's what you get when you use a made-up word.

This is my last post from Greenland, but I hope to keep this going.  My first concept of an aquateer blog or website was something concerning water, a topic I profess at least to care deeply about.  I thought I could alternate between informative calls to action on privatization of water rights, aesthetically stirring pictures of water in all its forms, and quirky or humorous water-related topics.  Not too preachy, not too frivolous.  But then here I was flying over the second-largest piece of frozen water on Earth, and I thought, well, why not start now, whether I know what I'm doing or not.

Speaking of that ice cap, I got to actually stand on it yesterday.  It's maybe a 90-minute drive from town (or I hear more when the snow melts to reveal a rutted, washboarded road.) And on the way we saw a fantastic mr. arctic fox posing like a wolf (I wish I'd raised a fist in respect) and on the way back we saw a reindeer.  I could show you the photos, but the reindeer is like 19 pixels big, and the Arctic fox photo needs that Hollywood "enhance" plug-in they're always using in the movies but I haven't bought yet.  I did see a hippo though:

 It was pretty darn cool hiking around on the ice sheet.  It was still covered by snow, which made it easier.  And then we went to the Russell Glacier calving front and could actually hear it popping and creaking.  And we could walk over and pick up glassy cubes of ice that had recently fallen off, ranging in size from a mango to a breadbox to an acme safe.

Russell Glacier terminus

I was kind of hoping this would calve while we were there.  And by kind of, I meant, bring it on!  I'm ready to make a dash for safety!

The last couple days, Kathryn and I chose not to fly, for a variety of reasons.  I think it was a good call; we didn't miss much in terms of scenery, and with the much-appreciated help of our peeps back at Goddard, we did get another video out.  (it was on the NASA website too, but I like to get those youtube hits up.)

And despite a sleep deficit, I got out one more time to snap some auroras.  I could do this every night for ever and ever.  There was supposed to be a significant storm, and as you can see above, they were quite pretty for a while, but by midnight or so they'd faded.  But I still had fun out there with the cosmos.  Billions of snowflakes around, billions of stars above.  It was not easy, and I was far from perfect, but I'm very glad I went to Greenland.

SE Mop-up

Apr. 11
Kanger

Auroras seen:  4
Flight hours:  24
Days left in Greenland:  3

Someday I'll be ready to tell the story of today's flight.  Just not today.

For now, a few pictures.

Last night's aurora over the KISS building where we stay, and a half moon.

It's getting noticeably lighter here.  This was taken around 10:30 -- still a little blue in the sky.

Almost everything white you see in this picture is not snow on the ground or clouds, but snow whipped up by the wind.

Some gnarly peaks.

Notice the haziness of the glacier ice just below us in this photo -- that's due to the exhaust trail of the engine.  Just one of the challenges while shooting on the P-3.

Sweet sweet sea ice

head clearing slightly. clouds, not so much.

Apr. 9th
Kanger

Morning windchill:  -31 F
Flight hours:  18.2
Number of kleenex used:  honestly, a new PR.  It was unreal.
Sonicare:  down to one bar
Beard status: Actual!  (I even had to do some maintenance today.  That's when it's official.)


I decided not to fly this morning.  I'm desperately trying to beat a savage cold, for one thing, and a flight where they just go to a magnetically-benign part of the ocean and fly around to test instruments sounded boring.  But I'll let Operation IceBridge Project Scientist Michael Studinger tell you what I missed:

"This morning we woke up to the good news that a government shutdown has been averted and we began our usual aircraft warm-up routine at 5:15 am LT. The forecast was hopeless for all science missions from Kangerlussuaq and we decided to do a radar calibration and magnetic compensation flight which we cannot combine with a normal survey flight because of the extreme roll maneuvers. After flying on straight lines with a 15º limit on bank angles (almost) everyone enjoyed the 60 and 90º roll maneuvers at FL190 over water to determine the radiation pattern of the MCoRDS antenna array. During these maneuvers “the ship” rapidly loses altitude and drops down like a rock with 1G. The view from the cockpit is priceless.

The weather forecast for tomorrow looks poor and the airfield is closed on Sundays in Kangerlussuaq. Thus, tomorrow will be a hard down day for crew rest."

In other business, it was brought to my attention today that I haven't even described what Operation IceBridge is in any of my posts.  (One would think I might have started with that.)  Soon, I'll give it my best shot, but for now I'll just say they fly around in aircraft measuring land and sea ice with a bunch of lasers and things

But if you want to read what a real professional blogger has to say on IceBridge, check out Kathryn's excellent entries on the official OIB blog.  We've got some of our timelapses there too.

So before I get some sleep, here are some shots of yesterday's absolutely stunning flight.  The first shot is from Dr. Studinger himself, who can often be found shooting through the only window on the plane with 'optical glass,' meaning it's not quite as smudged and scratched as the rest of them.

That's a hard shot to follow, so I'll cleanse the palate with this minimalistic selection:

And move out to sea with these two:

And finally, to bed.

smooth skies ... but shutdown looms

Apr. 7
Kanger

Flight hours:  10
Latitude achieved:  76 degrees North (new PR!)
Favorite words on my milk carton:  'assigiiaaqqissaarneqarsimasuuvoq' and 'ullullu'
(Which might mean: 'homogenized' and 'use')


Had a great flight today.  Just fabulous.  After skipping yesterday's makeup flight to Jakobshaven (I know, I know) in order to finish a video and try and avert a total shutdown of my nasal passages, I got on board a much more scenic flight today where we transected a bunch of glaciers over and over.  Like this:

 A view from the cockpit:

And another:

And one more:

Felt pretty good all flight and was congratulating myself on skipping the less interesting one yesterday in order to gain strength for today's, but then arrived back at the base and just crashed.  Head stuffy, nose in pain, wits dulled, keep feeling like I'm falling, or in a plane that hit a low pressure zone.  Bought a vial of inky brown medicine the kid behind the counter said was for colds.  "Are you cold or [sniff sniff]?" he asked.  I took a swig on the way out the door and it was so nasty I literally wasn't sure for a few minutes it was meant for internal use. 

Feeling slightly better now, but weighing my physiological shutdown against the potential that tomorrow's flight could be the last if the government shuts down.  All civil servants and closely-affiliated crew are to cease work and head home if that happens.  Given the amount of time, planning, and money, not to mention scientific-data-set hopes and dreams, that went into getting the 28 of us all up here, it's a disheartening possibility.  They attempted to have us declared 'essential personnel' but in vain.  Our project lead though had encouraging words, to the effect that the mission will resume when the government gets back in gear, and the scope of our mission always fluctuates due to factors out of our control.  If we only get 80% of our goal this year, we'll get 120% the next.

So the plan is to fly tomorrow, use Saturday as a packing day, take advantage of the fact that Sunday the airport is closed, and if they still haven't reached a consensus back in the District by Monday, twenty-four members of the crew pile into the available seats on the P-3 and fly back to Virginia, while the remaining four of us are left to return home on our commercial flights (for me next Thursday), or rebook them, or see if the New York Air National Guard 109th Airlift Wing will squeeze us on a flight back to Schenectady.  Stay tuned.

Ok, four random crew shots to cheer us up: