At EGRIP, the crew continued to excavate the sled and the ski under the dome. It is a lot of physical work to cut and remove hardened snow blocks. But progress is made, and more and more of the undercarriage of the dome is exposed. We aim at having the dome pulled to the surface on Friday. We also plan for the stay of a repair crew from the Air Guard next week.
On traverse, the drill team went back to B17 to complete drilling there. This was not without issues. The generator went into overload; but the team managed to complete the 14 m drilling (corrected May 29th from 20 m). Drill team returned to the main traverse at WP060 in the evening. Main traverse proceeded along the planned route, having a stop at WP050 and then proceeded to WP060 where they spent the night. Both radars were working well en-route, and snow and pit samples were taken on the way. We had regular communication with the traverse via several devices.
What EGRIP did today:
- Excavating main dome.
- Monitoring traverse movement.
- Coordinating with New York Air Guard on the upcoming repair mission of the broken LC-130 at EGRIP.
Weather today: Periods of sunny and clear and overcast and light snow. Temp. −25°C to −14°C. Wind: 15 kt from W, in the evening dropping to 6 kt. Visibility: Good to poor, depending on cloud cover and precipitation.
What traverse did today:
- Left WP030 at 10.20 local.
- Arrived at WP 050 at 13.20.
- Arrived at WP060 (74.7778 N; 37.8385W). The entire traverse crew spent the night here.
- En-route: Took snow samples and one liner pit snow profile. Radars are working.
- Regular contact with EGRIP. In-Reach reporting working all day.
- Shallow drilling at B17 completed; generator over load due to damaged winch motor on shallow drill.
FL, J.P. Steffensen and TL, Helle Kjær
