Today we had a LC130 mission (call sign: Skier 13) scheduled to come here to GRIP, bringing much needed fuel and drill cargo for our camp, and in the afternoon Skier 13 came in straight from the south for our skiway and landed here at GRIP! Thomas, Sepp, Jonathan and Grant expertly carried out the cargo handling and defueling together with the great crew of Skier 13, and after exactly and hour on snow the skier was airborne using less than 2/3 of the length of the skiway to get off snow, taking off northbound against some 12 knots of wind. Later on, we got the welcome news that all the skiway grooming efforts of Thomas since the last flight period had made the skiway so fast and even, that the pilots increased the skiway rating to maximum possible payload! This will help us tremendously in getting fuel and cargo to camp. The GEUS Twin Otter also departed GRIP today, so we all said goodbye to the GEUS team right after lunch after 5 great days enjoying their company when they were back from their successful missions. Making good use of her training from yesterday, Chantal again helped out Peter, so he could do both a pit study (including snow density, stratigraphy, temperature, specific surface area), as well as a density transect with the snow micro pen before lunch. The pit was done in the clean snow zone about 100m away from camp, and is now flagged. In camp the drillers are continuing their experiments on how to drill a mix of ice and fiberglass (see report below), while the solar panel team again had to pause their work due to wind. Instead, they made sure our southern lead in flags for the skiway were serviced, and also managed to take down the scaffold they have used. Sepp started out the cable duct work to connect the final weatherport to power, and Carlos continued the luminescence measurements.
What we did this Monday:
- Said goodbye to the GEUS Team, as they left for Mestersvig in the Twin Otter.
- Inspected and cleared all southern lead-in flags of frost and snow.
- Received Skier 13 with critical cargo and 7200 liters of fuel for camp.
- Loaded retro cargo on Skier 13, before it left GRIP using less than 2/3 of the Skiway.
- Skiway upgraded from a payload of 17400 lbs to a payload of 32400 lbs.
- Tested the hole saw cutting a mixture of fiberglass and ice.
- Continued work on storage trench.
- Started work on cable duct to food Weatherport.
- Assisted the GEUS team with pit and density study in clean snow zone.
- Continued luminescence measurements.
Re 5: Drillers’ report:
Tested the hole saw cutting a mixture of fiberglass and ice very successfully. Prepared the hand auger for the same test above. Received an undersized concrete corer, again to testing. Received a Skier with many spare parts – a big day of work begins tomorrow.
Weather: Monday was mainly cloudy with some sunny spells. Temp. from -14C to -9C. Wind 6-14kts, mainly from NNW and N.
FL, Bo Vinther
