9 Jan 2008 3425 meters above sea level Maximum & Minimum temperatures: - 26 to - 38 °C Lighter loads, good snow conditions and driving down hill over the last days combined with no technical problems led us to hope that we had left the differential breakdowns behind. But, that was not the case. This afternoon, the rear differential on Chinook broke down for the third time. The replacement started immediately – Kjetil and Einar went out in the cold winds of Antarctica to get us back on the road again as soon as possible. - Jan-Gunnar Photo: Unfortunately, this is how our sled...

8 Jan 2008 3463 meters above sea level Maximum & Minimum temperatures: - 24 to - 37 °C We are at about one fourth of the distance between the Pole of Inaccessibility and the South Pole. Here a short science stop was planned and the ice core drillings (totally 40 meters) and snow pit studies were accomplished in a very efficient manner. We are quite well “drilled” by now! In the evening, we watched a movie (again). We can not complain about the facilities – they are of a very high standard and appreciated by everyone. - Jan-Gunnar Photo: Our living/kitchen module – the ...

Tuesday January 8th, 2008 The whiteboard has a message: "Textas in reading room. Bags will go down this arvo.get cupping." Our international friends struggle with the cryptic advice, understanding neither 'arvo' nor 'textas', but cotton on when they see people decorating polystyrene cups with marking pens, stuffing them with paper towels and putting them in the net bag in the instrument room for dispatch to the abyss. Martin points out in the sitrep "CASO is a major multinational project for the International Polar Year involving scientists from 18 nations and is led by Australia." ...

Contents: 1. St Petersburg SCAR/IASC Meeting, July 2008 2. Other impending conference deadlines 3. IPY Science Day: Changing Earth, March 12th 2007 4. APECS update 5. Videos on IPY.org Report no. 9, January 2008 From: IPY International Programme Office To: IPY Project Coordinators cc: IPY Community Google Groups 1. Joint SCAR/IASC Open Science Conference, 8-11 July 2008 Arctic and Antarctic Perspectives in the International Polar Year St Petersburg, Russia Information about this conference can be found at: http://www.scar-iasc-ipy2008.org/...

Expedition Diary January 7, 2008 3500 meters above sea level Maximum & Minimum temperatures: - 24 to - 35 °C Never a uniform white blanket on the ice sheet, the character of the surface snow takes on many different forms. On the microscale, different crystal forms tell stories of their arrival to the surface as gently falling snow, wind-battered hard pack, or deposition as surface hoar through condensation events. To a traverse train of vehicles, generous amounts of gently-fallen snow represent “snow swamps” in which the treads sink and dig their way in, sometimes preventing a vehic...

Expedition Diary January 7, 2008 3500 meters above sea level Maximum & Minimum temperatures: - 24 to - 35 °C Never a uniform white blanket on the ice sheet, the character of the surface snow takes on many different forms. On the microscale, different crystal forms tell stories of their arrival to the surface as gently falling snow, wind-battered hard pack, or deposition as surface hoar through condensation events. To a traverse train of vehicles, generous amounts of gently-fallen snow represent “snow swamps” in which the treads sink and dig their way in, sometimes preventing a vehic...

January 7th 2008 I am halfway through my sojourn at sea and loving the perpetual motion of the ship. We are moving through an endless ocean in apparently endless circles. Not having a 'destination' is quite a nice thing. There is nothing on the horizon for 360 degrees. There's no ice to be seen, not even a growler. We are nearly 200nm north of Cape Denison on the Antarctic continent, adrift on a lonely sea. In fact we do have a purpose. This is the CASO (Climate of the Antarctic and Southern Ocean) sampling area. We must cover 31 stations in six days making CTD drops of around 3,600 metres to sample the cold, dense, Antarctic bottom water that drains from the Mertz Glacier. We are working over the skid marks on Rob's Gondwana map that show the seabed cany...

Sunday January 6th 2008 A clatter of footsteps in the stairwell is a sure signal to grab the camera and follow the mob. I raced up to C deck and saw a distant spouting. The CTD door was open to the sea so I ran back down to E deck. The CASO crew was riveted, watching a pair of humpbacks curving and spouting. They moved aft and we all jumped like fleas across the trawl deck to watch them coast and roll and play in a large drift close to the ship. I scurried up to the mezzanine, craning over the ship’s rail on the way, keeping them in sight, then made a dash up the stairwell and back onto C deck. Rail spac...

Sunday January 6th 2008 A clatter of footsteps in the stairwell is a sure signal to grab the camera and follow the mob. I raced up to C deck and saw a distant spouting. The CTD door was open to the sea so I ran back down to E deck. The CASO crew was riveted, watching a pair of humpbacks curving and spouting. They moved aft and we all jumped like fleas across the trawl deck to watch them coast and roll and play in a large drift close to the ship. I scurried up to the mezzanine, craning over the ship’s rail on the way, keeping them in sight, then made a dash up the stairwell and back onto C deck. Rail spac...

Written 6 January, 2008 3608 meters a.s.l. Maximum & Minimum temperatures: -29 to -35 °C Nearly all the way from Troll Station to the Pole of Inaccessibility we have driven along the crest of the continent. On this last leg towards the South Pole we have left the ridge and will gradually be descending to lower ground. This implies different patterns of winds and snow accumulation. We are starting to see the effects of this in the shape of rougher snow drifts and more sastrugi, so the ride is getting bumpier. However, there are positive side effects to this. One is that it is much easier for the drivers to...