Friday, December 5, 2008

The deepest drillhole the drill had ever drilled


Friday 5th December

Lots of news from the field today! And lots of good news for all that matters :-) Firstly, let's start with the drill team's record breaking event: they drilled 30 meters deep yesterday. This means that not only does the drill work, it exceeds all expectations. Which means you can picture how happy Bryn, Denis and Jean-Louis are about it. Secondly, the radar team. They had a less successful day yesterday: white out all the time, they didn't really get out, let's forget about data
collection. However, considering how much ahead they were on the planning, this really doesn't matter. A bit of a contemplative day it thus was for Kenny and Frank, who, according to their summarized report over the phone, had both productive moments (paper writing and equation solving) and metaphysical experiences due to the surrounding of the "big white", the silence that swallows all sounds, and possibly more.

As for Alain, who thus went for the coastal reconnaissance of the arrival site for the boat, he gave extremely good news too: they moved from Breid Bay to Crown Bay. And at Crown Bay, they found the perfect natural shape for the unloading site: a soft slope, allowing for the easy mooring and unloading of the ship. So, they're coming back to base camp as we speak, with an additional stop at the BELISSIMA base camp.

And base camp, well, is still what it was. Although we have better weather today, and the difference is immediately noticeable in people's mood. Jokes over breakfast, and the ability to move from containers to the station to the tents without feeling like leaving for a life threatening adventure.

Nathalie

No comments: