The Last Polar Bear records and celebrates one of nature’s most majestic creatures — the polar bear — and examines how global warming is affecting the fragile, complex Arctic environment. Polar bears use sea ice to move about, find mates and hunt for seals. As temperatures warm, the loss of the pack ice directly impacts their ability to survive. Scientists agree that Arctic ice is disappearing at an alarming rate. Last summer, sea ice levels plummeted to their lowest since satellite measurements began in 1979. And a new scientific study by the U.S. Geological Survey, released last fall, predicts that two-thirds of the world’s polar bears, including Alaska’s entire population, may disapp...

This morning, just 62 years ago, Byrd and his Ice Party members, including Yours Truly, sailed up the Bay to the D.C. Navy Yard... So wrote Dr. Alton A. Lindsey to the author on May 10, 1997 — he had turned 90 only three days before. In the early years of the Great Depression, he was at Cornell University studying for his doctorate in biology, when he interrupted this pursuit to serve as the Vertebrate Zoologist on the Byrd Antarctic Expedition II (1933-35). While the interior of the continent was canvassed by dog sled, tractor and airplane, Lindsey studied penguins, seals and other animals on the coast. ...

Contents: 1. IPY Science Day: Changing Earth, March 12th 2008 2. Send us your stories! 3. St Petersburg SCAR/IASC Meeting, July 2008 4. End of IPY Celebrations 5. Workshop and summer school opportunities for students 6. The Legacies of IPY Report no. 10, February 2008 From: IPY International Programme Office To: IPY Project Coordinators cc: IPY Community Google Groups 1. IPY Science Day: Changing Earth, March 12th 2008 The IPY Science Day on March 12th will focus on change over geological time, especially the glacial and interglacial periods that have occurred during the past million years, and cycles of ocean- atmosphere interactions that give rise to r...

6th February 2008 Last week was a blowout when it came to using the twin otters — until Thursday. Then we split into three teams. Two teams managed to get a seismic site and two GPS sites in on Thursday while Abel, Mitch and I went north on a helicopter to do a tie on Brimstone Peak on Friday night. As a night flight things got a bit colder and we were dodging low clouds all the way up through Victoria Land, passing flights of raised beaches on the way. We landed in a swirl of cloud and snow on the south side of Brimstone, and lugged our gear over to the tie. The tie will mean that old data from a ...

PRESS RELEASE New book from the Natural History Museum Surviving Antarctica by David N. Thomas Foreword by Ray Mears “In this fascinating book David Thomas takes us to Antarctica in a very personal way...” From foreword by Ray Mears. In a land of terrifying winds, fearful cold and icebergs the size of London, survival is everything. Journey to the end of the Earth and discover how life survives some of the most extreme conditions on the planet in Surviving Antarctica. This timely book provides an invaluable insight into the lives of all beings living and working in this hostile environment. Find out how scientists prepare for an expedition, how male Emperor penguins use their feet to protect their...

The NASA HOW (History of Winter) program is held each February (since 2000) in Lake Placid, New York, USA. The HOW Program brings together teachers and learning professionals from around the United States to study SNOW, ICE and the WINTER ECOSYSTEM through intensive classroom and fieldwork exercises led by experts in the field. This year the program is held February 10-16. Also this year, The Global Snowflake Network (GSN) will be launched. Peter Wasilewski and Robert Gabrys created and developed the NASA HOW (History of Winter) program held each February since 2000. The primary foci of the weeklong program (February 10 - 16, 2008) are threefold: 1) SNOW - in the air and on the ground 2) ICE - crystal structure and axial orientation 3) WINTER E...

29th January 2008 Wow, I know that last entry was a bit of moan-fest, but hey – as they say ‘round here, it’s a harsh continent. Today was better, actually quite a bit better. We managed to get a bunch of our gear out to the site at Lonewolf Nunatak (my vote for windiest place on the planet) and also built a new GPS station at an old NASA GPS site in the Kukri Hills just to the west of McMurdo. There’s nothing like a bit of productive work to lift morale a bit. It was a warm(ish) day with no wind on the mountain, just a little snow now and again. We finished the guts of the station pretty quickly, the drilling of the monument took a whole lot longer than expected though. Even so we ended up with a good install and had time for a bit of a walk. ...

Saturday, 26 January Hi, and good morning. Yaaawn... it’s me again, Nils. Yaaaawn... We had a long night here on board FS Polarstern, followed by a cold, wet and stormy morning. Now it is 11 a.m., I am frozen to the bones, my stomach is unhappy about the waves, and I have been on my feet for 27 hours. Well, about that long. I should tell the story from the beginning. We are on our way home, at a station at 52° southern latitude. Two months ago we have already been here once to take samples. Now, on our way back, we are taking samples again at the same spot to see if anything has change...

28th January 2008 We’ve been back in McMurdo now a week. Unfortunately we’ve not been anywhere near an aircraft. It’s the end of the season here in town, and things are supposed to be winding down. The weather, which has been marginal, to put it mildly, all season, has not really improved much and our project is getting pushed back, and pushed back, and pushed back. The crash that our team was involved in earlier in the season is eating up a lot of resources, with a camp and mechanics out in Marie Byrd Land feverishly trying to put humpty-dumpty, sorry – I mean the Basler, back together again before the weather changes for the worse. Unfortunately that’s sucking up resources here, which means that our weather window is moving back and back into the autumn. ...

Elevation: Close to sea level Maximum and Minimum temperatures: -55 °C (estimate at midnight during the flight from McMurdo to Christchurch) & -2 °C It was time to leave the continent. Our C-17 flight was delayed several times so we were mostly stand-by in McMurdo from lunch and onwards. The morning was used for final interviews with PolarPalooza. At 6 p.m. the transport to the Pegasus airfield took place. At 9.30 p.m. we were airborne and at around 2.30 a.m. on the 26th January we landed smoothly in Christchurch. For the first time in three months it was dark outside! This will be the last diary...