Guest Author • Feb 28, 2013 •
Date: 27/2/2013 Location: 66.5914˚S, 148.064901˚E Weather: 10 knots and clear Sea state: Calm …Nothing quite like it for cooling the blood. Especially when the air temperature is below freezing. Multibeam data for canyons. [Helen Bostock; data supplied by Alix Post,Geoscience Australia]We have successfully collected a couple of cores from the Antarctic slope in between some … Read More
Guest Author • Feb 27, 2013 •
Writtenby Helen Bostock (Marine Geologist, NIWA) and Elizabeth Shadwick (ACE CRC) Date: 26/2/2013 Location: 65.111248°S, 146.056312°E Weather: Sunny, less than 20 knots Simplified Antarctic food web. [Courtney Derriman]Sea state: 1-3 m swell Phytoplankton are microscopic plants that live at the surface of the ocean. There are billions of them in ocean surface waters, which are then grazed … Read More
Guest Author • Feb 26, 2013 •
Written by Dr Helen Bostock (Marine Geologist, NIWA). Date: 25/2/2013 Location: 65.507326°E, 143.982206°S Weather: Cloudy and foggy, gentle wind (<20 knots) Sea State: 2-3 m swell Given the issues we are having with accessing the coast due to the sea ice this year, it seems incredible that just over 100 years ago an Australian expedition landed … Read More
Guest Author • Feb 25, 2013 •
Written by Dr Helen Bostock (Marine Geologist, NIWA). Date: 22/2/2013 Location: 64.838758°S, 142.310661°E Weather: 20 knots, cloudy Sea state: 2-3 m swell Humpback whales We are now half way through the voyage…. it seems to be going by quickly. While most people were at lunch today, we were visited by 5 or 6 large humpback whales … Read More
Guest Author • Feb 25, 2013 •
Written by Molly Paterson (PhD student, Antarctic Research Centre, VUW). Date:21/2/2013 Location: 65.17903°S, 141.413812°E Weather: Cloudy with winds up to 30 knots Sea state: 3-4 m swell Molly logging a sediment core. [Helen Bostock]Over the last week, while the oceanographers have been studying the hydrology of the slope, the geologists have recovered two cores. We … Read More
Guest Author • Feb 22, 2013 •
Written by Emmanuelle Sultan and Helen Bostock (NIWA) Date: 20/2/2013 Location: 65.114305°S, 142.304997°E Weather: Cloudy and calm Sea state: Calm One of the primary aims of this voyage has been to monitor the formation of High Salinity Shelf Water at the Wilkes/Adelie Land shelf and its end product, the Antarctic bottom water. The Antarctic … Read More
Guest Author • Feb 21, 2013 •
Written by Dr Beatriz Pena-Molino (ACE CRC) Date: 19/2/2013 Location: 65.395795°S, 142.682921°E Weather: Sunny Sea State: Calm If you have been following this voyage for the last fortnight then you may well be wondering “what is a polynya?” Polynya is a Russian word used to describe areas of open water surrounded by ice. They occur … Read More
Guest Author • Feb 20, 2013 •
Written by NIWA oceanographer and voyage leader Dr Mike Williams. Date: 18/02/2013 Location: 65.225487°S, 143.020138°E Weather: Small storm clearing Sea state: 3-4 m swell improving to 1-2 m Over the last few days the sea ice has given us some of the highs and lows of the voyage. RV Tangaroa in the … Read More
Guest Author • Feb 19, 2013 •
Written by Helen Bostock (marine geologist, NIWA) Date: 17/02/2013 Location: 65.627268°S, 144.277825°E Weather: Cloudy, calm and very cold Sea State: Calm Over the last few days we have seen a lot of icebergs and have been skirting along the edge of the sea ice. ‘Patience….’ is the main advice of our Danish ice pilot, … Read More
Guest Author • Feb 18, 2013 •
Written by Helen Bostock (marine geologist, NIWA) Date: 15/02/2013 Location: 64.807561°S, 139.86694°E Weather: Snowing and breezy – 20 knots Sea state: 2 m swell Today we passed over the South Pole. Well, not quite, but very, very close by. How is this possible when we are on board a ship and haven’t set foot on … Read More