Daily reports from the NGRIP-camp - week 32 year 2000
Monday, August 7th
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| Daily life |
| Another nice day, even though night temperatures fell to -21°C,
the day has had -11°C and wind from 0-15 kn., with mainly blue skies.
Today it was noted that the camp was almost out of coffee, a search for
coffee was carried out. However no coffee was found in camp. |
| Science |
| The good news did not come today, unfortunately! The bailer is still
stuck. The temperature in the hole around the bailer has dropped some 6°C,
was is taken as a sign of that the frozen glycol is down in that part of
the hole and in action. More glycol will be dumped into the hole during
the next 24 hours. |
| Logistics |
| There is a lot of retro cargo in the camp, so the plan is to have two
flight missions when the camp is closed. The hopefully lower temperatures
in august will allow the skiers more retro load without causing take off
problems. |
Tuesday, August 8th
|
| Daily life |
| Excellent sunny weather today. |
| Science |
Until now 60 kg of frozen glycol have been poured into the drill hole
since the drill got stuck last sunday - however the bailer is still stuck.
A test today showed that the hammer on top of the bailer could only move
about 2 cm indicating that the top of the bailer is freezing in. It has
therefor been decided to continue dumping frozen glycol at 1 kg pr.
hour. Tomorrow at noon 50 kg of glycol will be dumped at once.
We all cross our fingers! |
| Logistics |
| Everybody who is not working hard in the drill trench these days is
working on cleaning the camp after a busy season, packing equipment, processing
data, grooming the skiway and many other things. The season is coming to
an end, the final pullout this year will be next week. |
Wednesday, August 9th
|
| Daily life |
| The cook served pancakes today and apparently people ate enough to
free the bailer .... |
| Science |
Good news: The bailer is free again!
At 18:30 p.m. 60 kg of frozen glycol were dumped in the drill hole.
At 22 p.m. the bailer finally got loose after one of the drillers had stepped
on the cable, slightly increasing the tension. Back on the surface it was
seen that the springs on the anti torque section of the drill
were deformed, apparently this is where the drill was stuck. The bailer
had not suffered any damage and it was full of frozen glycol. |
| Logistics |
| Packing, packing, packing, .... |
Thursday, August 10th
|
| Daily life |
| Autumn is now present in camp. Night temperatures were at -21 C and
daily max. was -11C, still mainly blue sky but a few banks of
ground fog have passed the camp today. |
| Science |
| The drilling / bailing ended today. To investigate how high in the
bore hole the glycol was present, a new smaller tank was mounted and lowered
into the bore hole. At 30 m above the bottom the tank was filled with liquid,
to see what kind of liquid it was. At 71 m above the bottom the winch failed.
This was most likely due to a switch on the control panel, the switch was
changed and the bailer was soon on it's way up again. Once up, the drill
tower has to be tilted from vertical to horizontal position.... During
the tilting of the drill tower the tilting motor broke! The motor was already
the spare motor, so there was nothing else to due, than to close the bailing/drilling
for the 2000 season. |
| Logistics |
| The dairy will continue until the camp is closed for winter and the
last persons have been flown out to Kangerlussuaq. |
Friday, August 11th
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| Daily life |
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| Science |
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| Logistics |
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Saturday, August 12th
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| Daily life |
| It has been snowing so the grooming of the skiway continued all day
long. |
| Science |
The drill trench was closed today - the season is really coming to
an end now.
Data have been prepared for further treatment at home. |
| Logistics |
| The main generator in camp is having problems. It needs a load of at
least 20 kW before it is running well, so for the moment all heaters in
camp have been turned on. |
Sunday, August 13th
|
| Daily life |
| It has been overcast and quite windy today, but there hasn't been a
lot of time for sun-bathing anyway. |
| Science |
| Dosimetres measuring the cosmic radiation at the bottom of an 11m deep
hole have been recovered today, and the preparations of the data for a
NGRIP CD have been finished. |
| Logistics |
| Today was the day of inventories. Everything that is being left in
the camp's garage, workshop and in the cooks freezer has been counted and
registered. This is very important for the preparations for next year's
season. |
Read more about Week 33
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