Our Expedition is at an End
Antarctica is full of familiar life doing really weird things. There is so much we still don’t know, and it’s so hard to get there and figure it out. Sailing the Drake passage, between South America and Western Antarctica, is famously rough but takes just a few days- short enough for tourist cruises. But New Zealand is as far from Antarctica as the Caribbean is from Africa. And the distance it takes to sail from Africa to Antarctica would take you more than 2/3 of the way from California to Japan. More people have been to space than have studied ocean life around East Antarctica. Pretty much everything is left to be discovered.
This trip has changed the way I look at ice and world geography. I’ve seen wildlife and landscapes that I expect I’ll never get to see again. But like any good science project, it’s really all about people. You may have noticed that most of my posts end with some kind of yelling about how incredible the staff, crew, and scientists are that I’m sailing with. I cannot emphasize enough how much I mean it. This expedition has changed me because I’ve experienced it with these phenomenal humans.
And with you. I wish I could treat you all to ice cream or something! I thought all day about how I’m legitimately sad to say goodbye, because sharing this expedition with you has forced me to reflect on it as it was happening. I would have missed some of the joy if I hadn’t had to describe it to you. And I’m saving every one of your messages in my “really good things” folder- you remind me why we’re all here, doing this work.
I’ll keep answering your questions directly if you message or email me before 12pm UTC (8am ET) on May 3. And remember that I’m bribing you so I can document the impact of this group to our funders, to try and convince them to spend money doing something like this again. I’ll send you a picture of me on the ship with a sign that says “Hello from Antarctica!” or anything you request if you DM or email me the answers to these 2 questions: How did you hear about this group? Was it just you reading the messages or did you share these updates with other people?
Thanks to everyone who’s already requested a personalized picture! I’m working on them.
Your questions:
- “Can you share more about the food there? Are you getting anything fresh? I assume you have some frozen items that keep you eating fruits and veggies?” We stocked up the day before we left New Zealand, a month and a half ago now. Bananas were the first thing to go, and we actually still have some fresh stuff! Cabbage, citrus fruits, apples, and kiwis. Everything else at this point is frozen or canned. The food ranges from tempura shrimp to chicken noodle soup to cinnamon swirl breakfast buns.
- “How are your mental health needs and the mental health needs of other professionals working in remote areas taken care of? Were ways to handle stress and conflict etc. taught during the training period?” I love these questions- this is a HUGE topic of conversation in the sciences right now. An increasing number of scientists are exhibiting PTSD-like symptoms because we see in detail the ways the world is becoming less hospitable to human life. And you nailed it- fieldwork has huge issues, mental health and otherwise. There’s no standard mental health training (or conflict resolution or other leadership/management training) that comes with being a scientist or going to remote places. There are flyers posted all over the ship for counselors available to us for free by phone. But I think our biggest support structure is each other. We check on each other every day. We play games together. We celebrate birthdays and holidays. We go through this together.
- “Do you also know the age of the layers of sediment you're seeing? If so: how do you do it and how old is the seafloor at certain depths there?” The reports you may have read about a million years of climate history are from huuuuuuge cores taken from very specific places, like the middle of the deep ocean or underneath very thick ice. We’re taking about 15 cm (7 in) of seafloor in our cores and we’re not aging it. This means we can’t even guess how old it is- what if a glacier scraped off the top recently? What if an underwater landslide dumped a bunch of mud where we’re coring? Because we’re not specifically trying to figure out age, we don’t know.
Your question: “Was is not too wavy because you’re more sheltered in the ice?” The waves were dampened by the ice, yes, but it depended on the type of ice. I LOVED watching the swells and waves roll underneath the looser, slushier ice. This question reminds me of how much movement there is in the ice. I feel like I’ve seen pictures of ice much more than videos, so here are 3 kinds of movement we saw often:
1. Swells sloshing underneath the ice (can you see them? Look in the middle distance for a wave rolling right to left and toward the ship).
2. Icebergs bobbing up and down.
3. Waves crashing around and into the icebergs.
Bye for real, friends ♥️
(this is called "porpoising", when penguins jump at the surface like tiny dolphins)
👋🥲 Virginia