By Louise Huffman, ANDRILL Coordinator of Education and Outreach During survival training known as Happy Camper School. ANDRILL (ANtarctic Geologic DRILLing) is in Antarctica for the second back-to-back drilling season. It is a multi-national science research team drilling rock cores from the McMurdo Sound area. With each new meter of core recovered, the scientists are working to unlock the climate secrets stored there. By understanding past climates, they hope to fill in missing pieces of the climate puzzle that will help us explain the rapid changes around the globe we are experiencing tod...

Submitted by Cristina Millan on November 12, 2007. Most people’s idea of a drill rig is that of the giant off-shore oil platform we are used to seeing in movies and in the media. The ANDRILL rig is nothing like that… This one is small, at least as rigs go, and can be put up and taken down in just a few days with a small crew. It is pretty compact and maneuverable, which were the main specifications when it was commissioned. It can be moved easily from one place to another, and is transported on skis almost everywhere within the continent, on roads that are groomed by bulldozers on the sea ice and on top of the ice shelves. ...

Contents: 1. Report from the JC Meeting 2. IPO announcement 3. International Polar Days 4. Ice Sheet Day: December 13th 2007 5. AGU 6. EGU/SCAR-IASC 7. Call for 2012 Science and Policy Conference Venue From: IPY International Programme Office To: IPY Project Coordinators cc: IPY Community Google Groups 1. Report from Joint Committee Meeting The IPY Joint Committee held its 6th meeting in Quebec City, Quebec, Canada, on two days in late October. For most of one afternoon we joined the Canadian National IPY Committee to learn and discuss the many facets of Canada's IPY programme. The JC focussed on IPY legacies, and pa...

In light of record low sea ice levels, several people have asked us for information on Sea Ice animations and images. NASA has released new images and animations showing changing sea ice and comparing with the average between 1979-2007. In addition, NSIDC (National Snow and Ice Data Centre) have regular updates and latest news about Sea Ice and links to a wide range of sea ice images, graphics and animations...

The IPY International Programme Office (IPO) has recently received some sponsorship to seed a meeting of the IPY International Youth Steering Committee (IYSC), including the Association of Polar Early Career Scientists (APECS). This meeting will occur in Stockholm at the end of September. Below is background material for this meeting. Meeting Details (252 KB DOC) includes participants, overview, agenda, and logistics Planning Information and Summary (128 KB PDF) APEC...

Several traverses across Antarctica are occurring this season, studying the East Antarctic Ice Sheet. They all have very informative and helpful web pages, as well as daily or weekly updates about their progress. Previous Expeditions: More information on previous International Antarctic Traverses can be found on the following pages: Summary of International Trans-Antarctic Scientific Expeditions (ITASE) Previous scientific traverses across East Antarctica almost fifty years ago Current Expeditions: ...

IPY is possibly the largest and most interdisciplinary science project ever conducted. Tens of thousands of investigators from dozens of countries are collecting data in diverse disciplines in physical, life, and social sciences. The data management challenge presented by IPY is huge. The current approach to the challenge is through an informal global partnership of data centers, archives, and networks working to ensure proper stewardship of IPY and related data. This partnership is called the IPY Data and Information Service (IPYDIS) and a new web site, discussion forum, and help desk has been established at http://ipydis.org to help coordinate the effort. The IPYDIS seeks to actively engage and support the IPY community, as such, advice, critique, and suppo...

Submitted by Cristina Millan on October 20, at 2am: I already said this year's location was beautiful but at night... there are no words to describe it. All photos below are from different days and different times throughout the night. Pretty soon we will not have this colors anymore, but for now... we have this! And there are no camera tricks! I took this photo of Mt Discovery (one of the many volcanoes nearby) a few nights ago, around 2 in the morning. It was bitterly cold but we all bundle up and went out for the show: Mt Erebus at 4:00 am two days ago. Early dawn: ...

By Louise Huffman, ANDRILL Coordinator of Education “Little” ANDRILL is about to leave us—probably as early as Monday, October 22, 2007, depending on weather. ANDRILL (ANtarctic geologic DRILLing) this year has two projects on the Ice, and they both have teachers involved in research immersion experiences. “Little” ANDRILL is actually the Mackay Sea Valley Seismic Survey (MSV) and “Big” ANDRILL is the Southern McMurdo Sound drilling project (SMS). Eight ARISE (ANDRILL Research Immersion for Science Educators) participants have become close friends as we have traveled and worked together over the past few weeks. ...

Janneke de Vries writes: The Forum on Biological Prospecting has been established and a call for submissions has been posted on the forum. Thanks to the colleagues who responded already to take part in the ICG. The work will be conducted in accordance with the following time table: 30 November 2007: Deadline for submissions on the web forum; 31 December 2007: Circulation of draft report of the ICG to the participants in the ICG; 28 February 2008: Deadline for comments on the web forum on the draft report of the ICG; 31 March 2008: Submission of report of the ICG to the ...